The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition that so far, the North American free-trade agreement talks initiated
by the United States this summer
have produced somewhat
comforting news -- no big upsets
and even progress on such
things as digital trade. The Globe's guest columnist Nelson Cunningham writes that the hopes of
progressive NAFTA reformers
will run into the stern resolve of
U.S. Trade Representative Robert
Lighthizer, whose instructions to
upend NAFTA are clear. In setting
forth U.S. objectives for the
talks last month, Mr. Lighthizer
first reflected his President's
focus, "Improve the U.S. trade
balance and reduce the trade
deficit with the NAFTA countries."
The news release accompanying
the written objectives trumpeted,
"For the first time
USTR has included deficit reduction
as a specific objective for
the NAFTA negotiations."
Canada's trade with the United
States is close to balanced. However, not so
with Mexico, whose trade deficit
with the United States is more
than $60-billion (U.S.) annually.
All other issues on the table
pale in comparison to the challenge
of fundamentally reshaping
the U.S.-Mexico trading
relationship to eliminate a deficit
of that size.
© 2024 Canjex Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.