LatinNews Daily - 03 June 2024

Mexico: On 22 May the fourth meeting of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) Free Trade Commission (FTC) took place in the US city of Phoenix, Arizona. Following the meeting US Trade Representative Katherine Tai, Canada’s International Trade Minister Mary Ng, and Mexico’s Economy Minister Raquel Buenrostro issued a joint statement in which they promised “to redouble efforts to advance the Agreement’s full implementation to help ensure that the North American economy continues to serve as a model for competitiveness and robust, broad-based, and equitable growth”. The ministers reviewed ongoing efforts to strengthen trilateral cooperation under the USMCA, in areas including agricultural biotechnology, electric vehicles, and textiles. They also committed to integrating small and medium businesses into regional and global supply chains, prioritising trade in pursuit of environmental objectives, and bolstering workers’ rights both in North America and beyond, through a commitment to banning goods produced using forced labour. The representatives of the three countries also discussed ongoing efforts to implement fully Decision Number 5, which came into force in February 2023. The Decision seeks to “to coordinate activities related to maintaining, re-establishing, or otherwise addressing issues related to the disruption of North American trade flows in an emergency situation”. Buenrostro and Tai also held a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the conference in which Tai expressed concerns regarding competition in Mexico’s telecommunications market and “persistent problems” in steel and aluminium trade between the two countries. The pair also agreed to “to work towards the resolution of trade disputes with the aim of mutually benefiting the people of both nations.” The next meeting of the USMCA FTC will be held in Canada in 2025.

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