ANSI Seeks Member Comments on U.S.-Kenya Trade Agreement Negotiations

Submit Responses to ANSI by April 10, 2020

On behalf of the U.S. standardization community, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) is seeking feedback to develop a response to a March 17, 2020, Federal Register Notice on negotiating objectives for a United States-Republic of Kenya trade agreement. As the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) develops U.S. negotiating positions, ANSI aims to ensure representation of views and concerns of the U.S. standardization community. The Institute encourages its members to submit comments to [email protected] by COB on April 10, 2020, for consideration in the consensus response.

The Trade Policy Staff Committee (TPSC) seeks comments regarding objectives identified in section 102 of the Bipartisan Congressional Trade Priorities and Accountability Act of 2015 (19 U.S.C. 4201).

In particular, the TPSC welcomes comments on issues that USTR should address in negotiations. These include, but are not limited to:

• general and product-specific negotiating objectives for the proposed agreement;
• relevant barriers to trade in goods and services between the United States and Kenya;
• economic costs and benefits to U.S. producers and consumers of removal or reduction of tariffs and non-tariff barriers on articles traded with Kenya; and
• the treatment of specific goods classified under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (HTSUS) under the proposed agreement, which could include comments on product-specific import or export interests or barriers, customs or trade facilitation issues, technical barriers to trade, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, transparency issues, or others.

Read the March 23, 2020, Federal Register notice: Request for Comments on Negotiating Objectives for a United States-Republic of Kenya Trade Agreement. The notice also announces a public hearing on Tuesday, April 29, 2020; those wishing to testify must provide written notification by April 15. Please see the notice for further details.

Submit specific written comments to [email protected] for consideration. For ANSI to have sufficient time to develop a consensus response, comments must be submitted by Friday, April 10, 2020.

ANSI also encourages individual companies and organizations to submit their own comments directly in response to the notice. Comments are due to USTR by April 15, 2020, using the www.regulations.gov website; enter docket number USTR-2020-0011. Further instructions are provided in the notice.