ThePigSite, UK
12-15-06
Pork Producers Praise Passage Of PNTR For Vietnam
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Calling it a tremendous victory for U.S. pork producers,
the National Pork Producers Council today praised congressional approval of
Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status for Vietnam.
The House and Senate passed the trade deal late Friday and early Saturday,
respectively, as part of legislation extending various expiring tax credits. It was
the 109th Congress’s last order of business before adjourning.
With PNTR, U.S. exporters can take advantage of Vietnam’s accession to the
World Trade Organization. (Vietnam will become a WTO member Jan. 11, 2007.)
Tariff rates for about 75 percent of U.S. agricultural exports to Vietnam, including
pork, will decline to WTO-bound duty rates of 15 percent or less. The tariffs on
pork variety meats, which are in high demand in Vietnam, will decline from a rate
of 20 percent to 8 percent over four years. Tariffs on most other pork products
will be reduced by 50 percent in five years.
“Granting PNTR to Vietnam means the U.S. pork industry will be able to ship
more product to that nation,” said NPPC President Joy Philippi, a pork producer
from Bruning, Neb. “This is a tremendous victory for producers, who will benefit
significantly from access to a market of 84 million people, where pork represents
72 percent of meat consumption.”
According to Iowa State University economist Dermot Hayes, the Vietnamese
accession deal will increase U.S. pork variety meat exports to the Southeast
Asian nation to $16.5 million by 2012 from $3.3 million in 2004 and will raise live
hog prices by $0.52 per hog.
Under a market-access agreement with the United States that was finalized in
May, Vietnam made numerous improvements to its implementation of WTO rules
on sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures and agreed to recognize the U.S.
inspection system for pork as equivalent to its inspection system. Additionally,
the U.S. will have recourse to WTO dispute settlement mechanisms should
Vietnam not live up to any of its obligations, an avenue of recourse that
previously did not exist.