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FTAA Negotiations: Structure, Status, and Civil Society

FTAA Negotiations Structure:

Trade Negotiations Committee - made up of deputy trade ministers. Chairmanship of the Negotiations rotates every 18 months, or at the conclusion of each Ministerial meeting. The chairs of this committee are:

• Canada, Argentina - May 1998/October 1999
• Argentina, Ecuador - November 1999/April 2001
• Ecuador - May 2001/November 2002
• United States-Brazil (co-chairs) - November 2002/December 2004

This committee oversees the Negotiating Groups, the Administrative Secretary, The Tripartite Committee, and the Committees and Consultative Groups. The Trade Ministers oversee the TNC. They are ultimately responsible for oversight and management of the negotiations. They generally meet every 18 months and, since the negotiations were launched, do so in the country which is holding the FTAA Chairmanship.

The Administrative Secretariat - was established to provide logistical and administrative support to the negotiations and to keep the official archives of the negotiations. The Administrative Secretary reports to the TNC and is funded by a combination of local resources and the IDB. The Secretariat is located in the same site as the meetings of the negotiating groups.

Negotiating Groups - In 1998 these nine negotiating groups were created. The groups are:

• Market Access
• Agriculture
• Investment
• Services
• Government Procurement
• Subsidies, Antidumping, and Countervailing Duties
• Intellectual Property
• Competition Policy
• Dispute Settlement

The venue of the negotiations is on a rotating basis. Three countries have been designated as hosts of the negotiations - The United States (Miami) from May 1998 to February 2001; Panama (Panama City) from March 2001 to February 2003; and Mexico (Mexico City) from March 2003 to December 2004.

Tripartite Committee - Organization of American States (OAS), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), and the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). This committee provides technical and logistical support (data bases, translations, dissemination of information, background studies, etc.). They also maintain the FTAA website. The US official position is that the Tripartite Committee should remain in a supporting administrative role. Other countries have lobbied for the committee to take a more central role in the process and to build stronger multilateral institutions to guide this process. The U.S. does not want the committee to have more control.

Organization of American States -

They have a trade unit whose primary function is “to support the OAS member states in matters related to trade policy and economic integration and, in particular, with their efforts to negotiate a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). The Trade Unit also provides information on trade and integration issues in the Americas through its publications and its Foreign Trade Information System, SICE.” (www.sice.oas.org).

Also within the OAS is the Office of Summit Follow Up. “The primary missions of the Office of Summit Follow-up are to coordinate the OAS' efforts in implementing the mandates assigned to the Organization by the Hemispheric Summits, and to serve as the "institutional memory" of the Summit Process” (www.oas.org)

Committees and Consultative Groups:

• Joint Government - Private Sector Committee of Experts on Electronic Commerce
• Committee of Government Representatives on The Participation of Civil Society (see below for more information)
• Consultative Group on the Smaller Economies

Status of the FTAA Negotiations:

We are in the current negotiating phase (May 2001 - October 2002). During this phase FTAA participants will agree on how to conduct market-opening negotiations by April 1, 2002, begin these negotiations no later than May 15, 2002, and produce a new version of their text by August 2002. The FTAA ground rules call for a “package deal” so nothing is final until it is actually passed at the end. The completed FTAA agreement will include when it is finalized trade rules, which each negotiating group is currently negotiating; market-opening schedules to be negotiated by five groups; and a general text to cover overarching and institutional issues. In April 2001, it was agreed to conclude the negotiations no later than January 2005 and to seek implementation no later than December 2005.

For those five negotiating groups that are dealing with the market-opening schedules (market access, agriculture, investment, services, government procurement) initial proposals have been submitted, but practical issues need to be resolved in order to begin negotiations on market access schedules no later than May 15, 2002. For example, which service sectors are to be liberalized; will US domestic supports to farmers be eliminated in agriculture; etc.

Points of Access for Civil Society:

Domestic level:

1. USTR
   USTR Office of Intergovernmental Affairs and Public Liaison (IAPL) administers the trade advisory committee system (see below) and “provides outreach and facilitates dialogue with state and local governments, the business and agricultural communities, labor, environmental, consumer, and other domestic groups on trade policy issues” (www.ustr.gov).
2. Governmental Interagency Working Group
   (EPA, Commerce, USTR, Labor, AID, Justice, FDA, State Dept. … )
   • Each of these agencies have a point person on civil society
   • The State Dept. is the lead agency on civil society participation
   • The interagency working group helps set US government formulation of trade policy and the USTR is the lead – they were created to balance all of the different interests of the agencies. Each agency should be consulting with their “constituents.”
3. Trade advisory committees - established in 1974 to ensure that U.S. trade policy and trade negotiation objectives adequately reflect US commercial and economic interests. There are three tiers: the President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations (ACTPN); six policy advisory committees; and 26 technical, sectoral, and functional advisory committees (see attached sheets for more information).
4. Congress

Hemispheric level:

1. FTAA Committee of Government Representatives on the Participation of Civil Society in the FTAA Process
   Sean Donnelly is the U.S. representative to this committee. He is charged with representing U.S interests with respect to transparency to the other FTAA countries in negotiating sessions.
   • Open Invitations - open invitations to civil society were first issued prior to the Toronto Ministerial in order to prepare a report to give to the ministers in Toronto. A second open invitation was issued after Toronto. A report summarizing these submissions was prepared and made public after the Buenos Aires ministerial. After the Buenos Aires Ministerial an open invitation to civil society was extended permanently. Contributions sent in to the committee before May 1, 2002 will be included in the report to the Ministers for their meeting in Quito in October 2002. As of April 2, 2002 there were approximately 15 submissions from across the hemisphere and none were from the U.S.
   • Report of the Committee - The second report is on the FTAA website. It summarizes input received from civil society in response to the second open invitation.
   • Periodic meetings of the committee with civil society - the most recent meeting was in Panama April 4 -5, 2002. After each meeting, the agenda is published (on the website in their press communiqué) and the next meeting is announced - date and place.
   • List of Options - At the Buenos Aires Ministerial, Ministers instructed the civil society committee to develop a List of Options. The document is still classified yet it has been leaked. See commentary by Scott Otteman, formerly of the Inter-American Dialogue (www.iadialog.org) who writes on the list of options.
   • Regional Seminars - The holding of 5 regional seminars was one of the list of options developed to “foster increased interaction with members of civil society in the hemisphere.” One is being planned in Mexico for the NAFTA countries.

2. Tripartite Committee - Organization of American States (OAS), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), and the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). This committee provides technical and logistical support (data bases, translations, dissemination of information, background studies, etc.). The OAS is creating a formal mechanism for civil society consultation. It is still unclear what role/potential there is for influencing the negotiations from this angle.

Some Requests made by civil society groups in the past:

1. Release of the full negotiating positions
2. Identify countries making proposals in the FTAA text
3. Direct contact between negotiators and civil society
   *Note: after the Buenos Aires Ministerial the Ministers said that civil society submissions must be transmitted to the appropriate negotiating group.
4. Report back and preparatory sessions before and after each negotiating session
5. Public hearings in each state
6. Equal access to trade ministers
7. Social, gender and environmental impact assessments

Background

Major principles for the negotiations - agreed to after the Fourth Ministerial in San Jose, 1988:

• Decisionmaking by consensus
• A single undertaking with balanced rights and obligations
• The possibility to participate in the FTAA process either individually or as part of a regional group
• The FTAA will be consistent with WTO rules and disciplines, and should improve upon these rules and disciplines wherever possible and appropriate
• The understanding that market access negotiations should make no a priori exclusions
• The coexistence of the FTAA process with existing bilateral or regional agreements (the “building block” approach)
• Equal rights and obligations for all parties taking into account differences is size and development
• A commitment to conclude the negotiations, to be started in 1998, by year 2005.