U.S. Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) and U.S. Rep. Michael Conaway (R-TX) threw their support behind an announcement that the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) would bring a case against China for excess commodity subsidies, the second such case this year.
The Office of the USTR announced that it will launch a trade enforcement challenge against China at the World Trade Organization (WTO) for its $100 billion in excess subsidies in a single year for corn, rice and wheat. The U.S. government said China’s actions demonstrate it breaking its WTO commitments and undermining American farm exports.
In September, Hoeven and a bipartisan group of lawmakers were in favor of the United States filing a separate compliance case against China for over-subsidizing its domestic crops.
“Now we find that China is engaging in other activities that put our farmers at an unfair disadvantage,” Hoeven said. “Trade agreements are meant to level the playing field for all countries involved, but when one country, like China, provides its producers with high subsidies and blocks market access, it needs to be held accountable.”
The Office of USTR also announced that it would seek enforcement action against China in response to illegal tariff rate quotas for wheat, corn and rice totaling more than $7 billion in 2015.
Conaway, the chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, said the committee has held hearings concerning the predatory trade practices of foreign countries that employ large subsidies, high tariffs and non-tariff trade practice to their advantage in the agriculture sector.
It is equally imperative for the U.S. government to take action to stop China’s improper conduct in the cotton market, which threatens the strength of the U.S. cotton industry, Conaway said.
“And while China is undeniably a bad actor on the world stage in terms of not honoring its trade commitments, other nations are taking a page from China’s playbook and upping the ante, with India’s current subsidy regime being similarly harmful,” Conaway said.
“India, China and other countries that threaten the livelihoods of American farm and ranch families and the 16 million jobs U.S. agriculture creates on and off the farm must be held to account. Trade agreements are only valuable to the extent they are honored by all the nations that enter them or they are otherwise enforced,” he said.