U.S.-Thailand FTA?
With the collapse of the WTO’s ministerial meetings in
Cancun
and the Doha Round dormant, the top
U.S.
trade priority now is to assemble an economic coalition of the willing by
cutting preferential trade deals with favored allies. U.S. Trade
Representative Robert Zoellick is currently negotiating preferential
accords with 14 countries.
Thailand
could soon become the 15th.
Even for those of us who greatly lament the inevitable political
and economic consequences of the trade-distorting world of preferential
“Free Trade Agreements,” a U.S.-Thai deal has some attraction. This is
because
Thailand
is one ASEAN country that seems genuinely interested in expanding trade.
Other Southeast Asian countries are laggards.
Malaysia
remains a negative drag in any free-trade forum. The
Philippines
has been resisting calls to lower tariffs and dismantle other trade
barriers that keep that country so poor. Some Philippine politicians have
actually advocated leaving the WTO.
Indonesia
, alas, is also presently in the tank.
Vietnam
looks to be the only regional player apart from
Thailand
that looks set for serious economic growth.
There are interesting arguments for a U.S.-Thai trade bilateral.
Thailand
presumably would have to do more to open its banking and insurance
markets, and crack down on the theft of intellectual property. While
politically difficult, some forward movement should be possible (and
definitely would be in
Thailand
’s own interests). The more interesting — and probably more difficult
— politics involves products that are politically sensitive for the
United States
.
Ford Motor wants to export light trucks from
Thailand
to
America
. Will the
U.S.
drop its infamous 25 percent tariff on foreign trucks? What a fine idea.
There is absolutely no economic justification whatsoever for the
U.S.
truck tax. Think of how this would pressure
Malaysia
, which would have to reconsider its crippling domestic content rules
aimed at protecting its uncompetitive Proton auto. But what would the
United Autoworkers of America have to say about this, particularly in an
election year?
And what about agriculture? Would the Bush administration give
Thailand
the same duty-free treatment on tuna packaged in pouches that it has given
Ecuador
? If so, what about other tuna countries like the
Philippines
? What about opening
U.S.
sugar markets? What about rice?
And would the Bush administration lower tariffs on the clothing
that
Thailand
would like to export? What would the congressional Textile Caucus think of
that?
This could get interesting.
Globaphobics do
Cancun
What a difference from
Seattle
, 1999. Throughout the five days of the WTO’s
Cancun
ministerial meetings last month, I never saw anyone wearing a ski mask,
never smelled tear gas, and never saw anyone try to smash through a
security fence. Aspiring violent protestors were kept safely six miles
away from the convention center.
Lori Wallach, the acerbic director of Public Citizen’s Global
Trade Watch who had loomed large on the streets of
Seattle
, cast a small shadow in
Cancun
. I saw her at a sparsely attended press conference on September 13, where
she bitterly blasted the White House for “bullying, bribery and
arm-twisting,” offering scant evidence to support her name calling.
Later, I saw her trying to work the press inside the convention center,
but nobody seemed to be paying her much attention. Wallach remains a very
angry woman, diminished politically because she really has little to say.
Oxfam, by contrast, was big in
Cancun
— and for the right reason. Oxfam has something to say. The
international human rights organization has produced well-documented
reports on how the European Union’s sugar subsidies and the U.S. cotton
program cause economic devastation in some of the poorest corners of
Africa. Oxfam has earned its seat at the table.
ActionAid, another international charity that is based in the
United Kingdom
and operates in about 40 poor countries, also wielded influence in
Cancun
, although not necessarily of a positive nature. Members of this private
pressure group became members of the official government delegations of
African countries like
Uganda
and
Senegal
. At the same time, other ActionAid activists worked the press inside the
convention center. They mainly offered intemperate and unsubstantiated
accusations about American and European alleged “bullying.”
Predictably, some newspapers picked up that theme — the British
Guardian, for instance, which has worked closely with Action Aid — and
helped inflame the negotiating atmosphere.
ActionAid, like Oxfam, rightly complains about rich-country tariffs
and subsidies. But here is the ActionAid advice for poor countries:
maintain your own high tariffs, use “safeguard” mechanisms to slap
quotas on imports, “protect” your own “strategic products” from
import competition, keep rigging your government contracts against
foreigners, discourage foreign investment and the role of the private
sector in your economies. What a wonderful prescription for perpetual
poverty!
“Licensed to Kill, Inc.”
The award for the funniest, most creative activist in
Cancun
goes to a young woman who identified herself as Corrie Prutspin, the
senior vice president of corporate communications for a tobacco
multinational named Licensed to Kill, Inc. Its website reports that
Licensed to Kill is incorporated in
Virginia
, its business being “the manufacture and marketing of tobacco products
in a way that each year kills over 400,000 Americans and 4.5 million other
persons worldwide.” The corporation expressed gratitude to the VA state
corporation commission for the registration, “noting that the societal
restrictions on serial killing luckily do not apply to corporations.”
The corporation’s other executives include Rich Fromdeath and Virginia
Slime.
Inside the convention center, not all reporters seemed to get the
Yankee humor. “I’m here to praise the WTO for putting trade before
public health,” Prutspin told two reporters from Latin countries who
soberly wrote down everything that she said, apparently unaware that they
were being put on.
