The interagency National Trade Negotiations Committee (CNNC) has announced that the DR will demand more products be exempted from trade liberalization measures when trade talks resume with the Caribbean Common Market (CARICOM) next month. CNNC spokesman Frederic Em?m-Zad? said that the DR will expand its draft "negative list" of products to, among other things, bring it in line with the Technical Rectification the DR made to its Uruguay Round world trade treaty commitments [the Technical Rectification, which came into effect last month, is an amendment of the DR’s agricultural trade commitments, allowing it to derogate from treaty rules to impose higher tariffs on eight categories when imports reach a certain quota level]. The DR signed a broad free trade agreement with CARICOM last August, leaving the details of implementing the free trade commitment to technical protocols to be negotiated later. Among these is a "negative list" of items not to receive some or all of the market access or tariff-cutting benefits of the treaty. When negotiators sat down last November to exchange drafts of the negative list, CARICOM demanded inclusion of 900 items while the DR was only seeking 15. Dominican negotiators suspended talks, saying both sides should reconsider their lists to seek a better balance in commitments. Last month it was agreed that the revised lists would be presented to a March meeting of CARICOM Prime Ministers in Suriname, who would then issue new negotiating instructions to the CARICOM team.In a related story, the news daily El Siglo reports that a reliable CNNC source says that there is little sympathy within the CNNC for Dominican industry demands for special sectoral protection under the treaty with CARICOM. In recent months the Dominican Metallurgical Complex (METALDOM), makers of glass beverage bottles, and producers of beans, corn, meats, milk, rice and sugar have all called for sweeping sectoral protections under the treaty protocols. Without such protections, they all argue, Dominican producers in these sectors will go bankrupt from CARICOM competition. El Siglo’s CNNC source noted that in each sector involved there is not a united stance among Dominican producers. If these sectors can produce a consensus proposal, then CNNC might entertain it. Absent that, CNNC will negotiate with CARICOM "whatever favors the Dominican consumer."
