Conaway endorses ‘zero-for-zero’ trade bill, but not leaving sugar out of TPP
August 05, 2013 | 08:57 PM
NAPA, Calif. — House Agriculture General Farm Commodities and Risk Management Subcommittee Chairman Mike Conaway, R-Texas, today endorsed the proposed “zero for zero” sugar policy that would tell U.S. trade negotiators to agree to a free market in sugar only if other countries drop their sugar subsidies and restrictions on imports.
But on the question of whether sugar should be left out of the Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership because the U.S. market is already oversupplied with domestic and Mexican sugar, Conaway declined to take a position.
Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla., has introduced a bill that would instruct the administration to target the foreign sugar subsidies that are distorting world prices and keeping a free market from forming.
His co-sponsors include: Reps. William Cassidy, R-La., Lois Frankel, D-Fla., Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., Doug LaMalfa, R-Calif., Trey Radel, R-Fla., Martha Roby, R-Ala., Tom Rooney, R-Fla., Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., and Frederica Wilson, D-Fla.
The American Sugar Alliance, which is meeting here, has endorsed the bill.
Conaway addressed the beet and cane grower group today and said “The danger for the United States in giving up its sugar policy is that other countries will not dismantle theirs.”
But when asked if increased sugar imports should be excluded from the TPP, Conaway said, “You really can’t answer the question definitively.”
With sugar in surplus, allowing more sugar to enter the United States is “hard to justify,” Conaway said, but trade negotiators “usually trade access for reduced tariffs for all kinds of things.”
Conaway said he would not “get ahead of the U.S. trade representative” on the issue, and that he would need more “facts and evidence” to take a position. He said he realized he had provided “kind of a typical D.C. fuzzy non-answer answer ... but it is unanswerable.”
But on the question of whether sugar should be left out of the Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership because the U.S. market is already oversupplied with domestic and Mexican sugar, Conaway declined to take a position.
Rep. Ted Yoho, R-Fla., has introduced a bill that would instruct the administration to target the foreign sugar subsidies that are distorting world prices and keeping a free market from forming.
His co-sponsors include: Reps. William Cassidy, R-La., Lois Frankel, D-Fla., Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., Doug LaMalfa, R-Calif., Trey Radel, R-Fla., Martha Roby, R-Ala., Tom Rooney, R-Fla., Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., and Frederica Wilson, D-Fla.
The American Sugar Alliance, which is meeting here, has endorsed the bill.
Conaway addressed the beet and cane grower group today and said “The danger for the United States in giving up its sugar policy is that other countries will not dismantle theirs.”
But when asked if increased sugar imports should be excluded from the TPP, Conaway said, “You really can’t answer the question definitively.”
With sugar in surplus, allowing more sugar to enter the United States is “hard to justify,” Conaway said, but trade negotiators “usually trade access for reduced tariffs for all kinds of things.”
Conaway said he would not “get ahead of the U.S. trade representative” on the issue, and that he would need more “facts and evidence” to take a position. He said he realized he had provided “kind of a typical D.C. fuzzy non-answer answer ... but it is unanswerable.”
