USTR RELEASES 2009 REPORT TO CONGRESS ON CHINA'S WTO COMPLIANCE

News Date January 05, 2010

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative presented its annual report on China's compliance with its World Trade Organization accession obligations to Congress recently. Congress mandated the report, which highlights the status of China's ongoing work in areas such as industrial policy, intellectual property rights, agriculture and services.  While the report acknowledges that progress was made in 2009 it also identifies a number of outstanding issues in a host of areas, including agriculture.

The report focuses six areas of compliance with regard to agriculture: Tariffs, Tariff-rate Quotas (TRQs) on bulk agriculture commodities, Biotechnology Regulations, Sanitary and Phytosanitary Issues, Inspection-related Requirements and Export Subsidies.

According to the report, China has timely implemented its tariff commitments for agricultural goods each year. However, China’s administration of TRQs on bulk agricultural commodities still does not seem to be functioning entirely as envisioned in China’s WTO accession agreement, as it continues to be impaired by inadequate transparency.

The report acknowledges continuing problems with China’s biotechnology approval process but indicates that major trade disruptions have been avoided so far.

Sanitary and Phytosanitary issues continue to be an area of deep concern.  Non-transparent SPS measures that appear to lack scientific bases, including BSE-related bans on beef and some low-risk bovine products, pathogen standards and residue standards for raw meat and poultry products, Avian Influenza bans on poultry and H1N1-related bans on pork all topped the list of problem areas in 2009.  In addition, China still does not appear to have notified all proposed SPS measures as required by WTO rules, although the report indicates that some progress has been made in that regard.

With regard to Inspection-related requirements, China’s regulatory authorities continue to administer inspection-related requirements in a seemingly arbitrary manner.

Finally, the report indicates that with regard to export subsidies, China has not yet notified all of its subsidies to the WTO.  This has made it difficult to determine whether China maintains export subsidies on agricultural goods.  (Contact: Amy Mann)