New developments indicate that the Central American and Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreements could be delayed into 2005. News reports indicate that powerful interest groups that do not agree with some terms of CAFTA could delay the passing of that treaty. The DR treaty is docked to CAFTA and thus depends on its passing.
Puerto Rican journalist John Collins reports for Caribbean Business that as the Free Trade Agreement negotiations move to Washington there are clear indications that the US-DR accord could run into some bumpy patches in this election year and could even find itself bogged down in Congress, resulting in inactivity until 2005. According to Collins, opposition to the DR FTA is relatively subdued and in fact there is considerable support for the initiative by members of Congress from US states with large Dominican populations like New York, New Jersey, Florida, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, among others.
On the other hand, the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) has aroused considerable resistance because it would result in increased market access for sugar and textiles from the Central American countries. There are reports that concessions made to sugar importers within CAFTA could meet with opposition from the strong Floridian sugar lobby groups. He mentions that only last week the Congress approved an FTA between the US and Australia because sugar had been excluded and that FTA is devoid of labor and environmental provisions that traditionally spark opposition.
Collins writes additionally that there is concern over the labor and environmental language in the CAFTA, with some US labor groups reacting with hostility. Although there are significant Central American populations in the US, they lack the same political clout of Dominicans.
According to Collins, a number of Washington observers are convinced that the Bush administration will delay seeking Congressional approval of the CAFTA until 2005 to avoid causing any conflict in an election year.
This would delay the approval of the DR FTA because the strategy of the United States Trade Representative Office is to dock the concessions made within the tailored DR agreement to those already agreed to as part of the CAFTA.
Observers indicate that there is a 90-day period before trade legislation is introduced and voted on. The administration’s failure to notify Congress of its intention to sign the CAFTA caused some apprehension on the part of Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Max Baucus (D-MT). He indicated that USTR Robert Zoellick advised him that such a letter was expected to be sent 9 February.
“The administration’s intent to sign the CAFTA deal before completing the market access negotiations with the DR to bring that country into CAFTA would be unacceptable because Congress would be denied the opportunity to review a significant portion of the anticipated agreement.”
He warned that “the failure of the administration’s intent to sign the CAFTA agreement before finishing negotiations with the DR could jeopardize ‘the so-called non-process’ through which Congressional committees of jurisdiction collaborate with the administration to develop appropriate implementing legislation on trade agreement.”