The 40th U.S.-Canada Inter-Parliamentary Conference is being held in Quebec City throughMonday. The meeting is attended by members of the U.S. Congress and the Canadian bicameralparliament.
Grassley said the conference provides a venue to discuss key issues for the Midwesterneconomy and help advance U.S. leadership in global trade. In particular, he said that it is a chanceto focus on some points of contention in advance of the next international trade meeting onagriculture later this year.
"I'm taking this opportunity to promote the elimination of all agricultural trade barriers andtariffs. Both the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement reached ten years ago and the WTO Agreementon Agriculture left many ag products subject to higher tariffs, shutting off trade in most of theseitems," Grassley said. "So, while Canada is our biggest trading partner and a helpful trade ally,Canada's remaining trade barriers must be addressed at the upcoming WTO meeting."
Canada is by far the largest trading partner of the United States. In 1998, total trade withCanada was 80 percent greater than U.S. trade with Japan, the second-largest trading partner. U.S.trade with Canada is greater than U.S. trade with the entire European Union combined and 15percent greater than all U.S. trade with Latin America. Canada is also the third largest U.S.agricultural export market.
Grassley is a regular participant in this meeting which each year brings together legislative leaders from the U.S. and Canada.
The U.S. will host the 134 member nations of the World Trade Organization in Novemberin Seattle for the WTO's 1999 Ministerial Conference. At this meeting, the U.S. will help launcha new round of multilateral trade negotiations that will address agriculture, services and other tradematters. Grassley said these negotiations "will shape world trade policy for decades to come."