UK Trade Deal - USMEF
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. Good news or the U.S. cattle industry as the U.S. and U.K. announce the framework of a trade agreement that would allow some duty-free beef trade between the two countries.
U.S. Meat Export Federation, President and CEO Dan Halstrom says the market is promising for U.S. beef, if a number of trade issues can be resolved …
HALSTROM … “There is no doubt that there is potential for U.S. beef into the UK. And for a little perspective, we've had, in the past, duty-free access, and currently have duty-free access into the EU, but when the UK departed the EU for Brexit a few years ago, we lost that duty-free access.”
So, from a tariff standpoint, Halstrom says the fact they’d create a zero duty, country specific spot for U.S. beef into the UK is definitely encouraging …
HALSTROM … “That being said, there's still work to be done from our viewpoint, because there's quite a few issues around non-tariff trade barriers that concern us, around market access restrictions, around plant approvals, around hormone usage, also around residue testing. While we're optimistic, we hope that these other non-tariff issues are taken into account as well.”
And while the announcement did not include news on pork, Halstrom says the UK could be a valuable market for U.S. pork producers.
The agreement will improve access for U.S. beef, with the UK agreeing to create a preferential duty-free quota of 13,000 metric tons. In return, the U.S. agreed to reallocate to the UK a country-specific tariff rate quota in the same amount for British beef entering the United States.
