"The project of the 2020s and the 2030s is different from the project of the 1990s," President Bidens national security adviser Jake Sullivan said, reflecting the change in US diplomacy. He added that Washington now has a different set of fundamental priorities than simply bringing down tariffs.
The Biden administration is now working to provide Japan and the EU with access to the clean-energy subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act, according to the article. The new deals focus on deepening economic ties, linking supply chains and leveling standards without touching customs duties. None requires congressional approval.
"In fact, the shift away from tariffs has been long under way, in part because tariffs are now so low. Most of the ill-fated TTIPs elements were about nontariff barriers (NTBs), such as regulations and industrial standards," Michaels writes.
Efforts to cut NTBs have been long under way, he added, citing An EU-South Korea FTA in 2011 dismantled barriers in cars, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, with Seoul following through by adopting chemical regulations modeled on EU legislation, opening the giant economy to Korean companies.
"Even if you dismantle tariffs, you might not have access to a market if you still have nontariff barriers," said Signe Ratso, a senior official at the European Commission, the EUs executive arm, who was involved in negotiating the pact.
"Even under Mr. Trump, a vocal opponent of free trade, the U.S. worked to remove nontariff barriers. The U.S. and EU food and drug regulators in 2017 signed a mutual-recognition agreement on good manufacturing practices for active pharmaceutical ingredients. Like the aviation agreement, it allowed the two regulators to shift inspectors from each others facilities to markets seen as posing potentially greater risks, such as China and India," he added.
He concluded by saying that the reworking of Nafta as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement in 2020, centered in large part around nontariff issues including digital trade, intellectual property and standards covering labor conditions and the environment in Mexican factories.
Source: Qatar News Agency