Jim McNerney, Chief Executive of Boeing, noted that the US economy is still “fragile” and said “We need to borrow less, save more, become more efficient and competitive and bring our exports back in line with our imports. Opening up and expanding new markets is paramount,” in his speech to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

The Financial Times states:

As chairman of President Barack Obama’s export council, Mr McNerney has been tasked with leading industry’s side of a campaign to double US exports within five years – an effort that the White House projects will create two million US jobs. Boeing is the world’s second-largest aircraft-maker and one of the US’s biggest exporting companies.

McNerney also added, “The Obama administration, in my view, is not moving fast enough. I would encourage them to move faster on … free trade agreements with Korea, Colombia and Panama.”

Although the US signed trade agreements with South Colombia, South Korea, and Panama in 2006 and 2007, Congress has failed to approve the agreements. Companies are looking to President Obama to get the ball rolling again to pass these agreements into effect.

Specifically, McNerney believes Korea and Colombia to be new markets where European corporations (Ahem, Airbus perhaps?) were able to export under a lower-tariff regime than US Companies.

Read more at: “Boeing urges faster action on trade deals” in the Financial Times.

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Vietnam wishes to increase its exports to help its economy, hit especially hard by the recent economic downturn. Prior to joining the WTO in 2007, Vietnam worked to modernize its economy.

Says ICTSD:

Photo by Moonlightbulb

If a deal is agreed, Vietnam’s primary commodities exports – crude oil, seafood, rice, coffee, rubber, tea, garments and shoes – could secure much easier access to the European market of more than 500 million consumers. The EU, meanwhile, would gain a promising new market for its exports of machinery, autos, farm products, and pharmaceuticals.

Trade between the EU and Vietnam totalled nearly €12 billion in 2008 and grew an average of nearly 12 percent per year between 2004 and 2008, the European Commission said in a statement.

With its recent trade agreements South Korea, Canada, Peru, and Colombia the EU is building a cluster of free trade agreements, opening its trade to many countries as an effort to jump start trade recovery.

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The talks will cover investments and industry sectors excluded from previous agreements, making it potentially the most comprehensive bilateral trade agreement ever reached – wider than the EU-South Korea deal.

Talks will being in Ottawa on Monday, with the aims of finalizing the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, or CETA, in 2011.

According to EuropeanVoice.com:

Hopes of success have been bolstered by the presence of Canada’s provinces, which have, in the past, been unenthusiastic about free trade with the EU. Their involvement is crucial, since it is the provinces that undertake the bulk of government procurement, a huge potential market for transatlantic trade. They also have wide competences in the labour market.

Earlier this year, the Council of the Federation, a conference of Canada’s provinces and territories, pledged to support trade talks with the EU. The council has a history of opposing public procurement provisions, such as those initially part of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

On 1 October, Jean Charest, the prime minister of Québec province and a member of Canada’s negotiating team, said that the participation of the provinces had convinced the EU that talks might succeed. The EU would like to use an agreement with Switzerland as a template for guaranteeing mutual open access to public procurement.

Carl Bildt, Sweden’s foreign minister, said after a meeting with Lawrence Cannon, his Canadian counterpart, on 1 October that the state of the world economy made a commitment to free-trade important.

Relations between the two sides are generally good but have been overshadowed this year by a Canadian decision to impose a visa requirement on Czech citizens and by a ban on seal products championed by the European Parliament.

Read more at EuropeanVoice.com: Talks to start on trade deal with Canada.

As part of the deal, South Korea will recognize European rules protecting regional products such as France’s famous Champagne bubbly, Italy’s Parma ham and Greece’s feta cheese. Conversely, some EU manufacturers – automotive in particular- are lobbying to prevent approval of the agreement as it would allow lower-priced Korean competitors into their home markets.

To ease car manufacturer concerns, Ashton said she had obtained “safeguards” to limit foreign content of cars assembled in Europe, giving EU authorities a right to impose temporary duties if they notice sudden surges of cheap car imports.

“I am very proud,” she told a news conference, “of the fact that we have been able to show not only that we were able to talk about fighting protectionism but that we were able to do the deals to open our markets.”

Under the agreement, the two sides will remove virtually all tariffs between their economies, as well as many nontariff barriers, over a five-year period.

The European Commission said that the trade in goods between the E.U. and South Korea was worth around €65 billion, or $95 billion, in 2008, and that the deal is worth €19 billion to European exporters alone. The E.U. runs a deficit with Korea in goods trade.

Ms. Ashton said that the agreement was “the first of a new generation of trade agreements” with countries that have high growth but also high entry barriers. She declined to say which country would come next

The EU-South Korea accord is the second-biggest free-trade deal ever, eclipsed only by the $1 trillion North American Free Trade Agreement between the U.S., Canada and Mexico that began in 1994.

The state-run Korea Institute for International Economic Policys estimates that Korea’s GDP may grow almost 3.1 percent in the “long term” as a result of the accord and may also lift employment by about 3.6 percent.

Additionally, according to the Financial Times:

The pact appears to match the US version quite closely. “There is no doubt the Korea-US agreement was used as a benchmark or even a model from the Korean side,” says Christopher Dent, professor of east Asian political economy at Leeds University in the UK.

The advances in the EU-South Korea trade agreement send an urgent message to the US, verbalized by South Korean Ambassador to the United States Han Duk-soo.

The United States will be at a competitive disadvantage in the South Korean market unless Congress approves a bilateral free trade agreement signed two years ago, a Korean official said on Thursday.”Korea strongly hopes this agreement will be put into effect as soon as possible,” South Korean Ambassador to the United States Han Duk-soo said.

Duk-soo also hopes that Congress will be able to approve the agreement prior to President Obama’s visit to Korea in November, after the Healthcare issues have been resolved.

EU-South Korea Trade Agreement References:

• “Europe & South Korea Take Step Toward Trade Pact” – New York Times
• “EU, SKorea reach trade pact” – AP
• “South Korea urges U.S. to approve trade pact” – Reuters
• “EU buoyed by draft South Korea trade deal” – Financial Times
• “EU, Korea Trade Deal May Be ‘Wake Up Call’ For US” – Bloomberg

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“Korea and the EU share the view that an early conclusion of the FTA and upgrading the Framework Agreement for Trade and Cooperation, signed by the two sides in 1996, are crucial to developing future-oriented partnership,” said a joint statement issued at the end of the summit.

They also agreed to increase cooperation on issues related to North Korea’s nuclear program, the global economic crisis, climate change, the energy crisis and the United Nations’ global peacekeeping programs, the statement said.”

Even in a global recession, there has been a lot of free trade agreement activity. Many countries are looking to new export markets in hopes to jumpstart their industries at home.

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