Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this nonmarkup today on the draft implementing legislation to the United States-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement (PTPA). I very much appreciate your efforts, as well as those of Chairman Levin, Ranking Member Herger, and Ambassador Schwab, to reach this historical moment today. Mr. Chairman, you have been nothing but open-minded throughout this process and willing to consider new ideas. Together, we have been able to produce a text that represents a good, solid compromise – a compromise that will yield us the bipartisan consensus, or at least the bipartisan majority, that has been our goal. In short, I believe that the new Peru agreement represents the best thinking of Americans on how we proceed with expanding trade around the globe.
The PTPA will provide new market access for American businesses, farmers, ranchers, and consumers, and it will promote economic growth in the United States and Peru. For example, in 2006, my home state of Louisiana exported $206 million in goods to Peru, including petroleum and coal products, agricultural products, processed foods, and chemical products. Louisiana businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises, and Louisiana farmers will benefit from the PTPA’s significant tariff cuts, regulatory transparency obligations, and elimination of other barriers to trade.
I believe our country’s relationship with Peru, as well as Colombia and Panama, is vitally important. For that reason, I was pleased to join U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and a bipartisan group of Members on a recent fact finding trip to these countries. We heard first-hand why the PTPA and the other two FTAs are so important to these three countries and the region.
The existing U.S. trade preferences with Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia have helped enormously with their economic development and with stability in the region. At the same time, however, I believe that it is time to move to a more substantial, mature, and reciprocal relationship through free trade agreements, as we are doing today with Peru. Compared to the unilateral trade preferences, the PTPA will make duty-free treatment permanent for Peru and will for the first time create reciprocal market access benefits for U.S. exporters. I might add that the PTPA and other pending FTAs create greater obligations on our trading partners than preferences – such as in the labor and environmental areas.
The pending FTAs with Peru, Colombia and Panama also are important to promoting stability and democracy in the region. U.S. implementation of these FTAs will help these countries continue to provide a successful alternative to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s vision of restricting free markets and increasing the role of the state in Latin America. Implementation of these FTAs also will provide positive examples to other countries in the region considering their economic and political futures, including Costa Rica where an October 7th national referendum will be held on CAFTA.
Peru, Panama and Colombia have approved their FTAs with the United States, and Peru and Panama have also approved the Protocols of Amendment to those FTAs reflecting the May 10th bipartisan trade deal. Peru has even been implementing all required labor obligations before Congressional consideration, which is unprecedented.
It is time for our Congress to approve these three FTAs and the Korea FTA. While action is long overdue, I am glad to see the Chairman is starting down this path today by moving the PTPA. I urge the Chairman to proceed to move the other three pending FTAs through committee and the House, so that U.S. exporters can begin to benefit from the same types of market access and legal protections that they will vis-à-vis Peru.
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