Washington Sen. Chuck Grassley held a hearing this morning to review the objectives set by the administration for agriculture during the upcoming round of world trade talks. The Iowa senator also asked the Finance Committee chairman to schedule a vote this fall on fast-track negotiating authority for the President. The ninth series of multilateral negotiations since 1947 is scheduled to begin November 30 in Seattle with 134 nations represented. Grassley said he convened today's hearing of the International Trade Subcommittee because many members have not seen specific information from the administration about how it plans to handle key agricultural trade issues such as tariffs, domestic support spending and biotechnology. During the hearing, Grassley featured the testimony of Jon Caspers, an independent pork producer from Swaledale, Iowa.
International trade is pivotal to farmers' prosperity in Iowa and across the country.
Grassley asked witnesses from USDA and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative how the administration intends to achieve success in lowering agriculture tariff rates and bind them, since the effort to do so in the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations failed. The conversion of quantitative restrictions to tariff rate quotas after this last round of talks left many agriculture products highly protected. Tariffs on ag products are three to four times higher than the ten to 15 percent rates for most industrial products. Some of these tariffs reach 200 percent or more. Grassley also pressed administration officials about challenging the European Union and other nations that heavily subsidize agricultural exports.