NPPC Vice President and Counsel for International Affairs Nick Giordano this week attended in Dallas the 12th round of negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement, a regional trade pact that includes the United States, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. NPPC met with officials from a number of the countries.
The TPP negotiations represent the best opportunity for the U.S. pork industry to remove sanitary-phytosanitary (SPS) barriers to trade and eliminate import duties in the countries involved in the negotiations. The TPP countries represent a population of more than 195 million people, and in 2011 the United States exported $294 million in pork and pork products to these countries.
NPPC is asking the Obama administration to urge TPP countries to remove tariffs on pork and SPS barriers to trade as well as to accept U.S. plant inspections as equivalent to the inspection systems in each TPP nation.