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Vetter says TPP is close

Issues remain, but the chief U.S. Ag negotiator in the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) says they’re getting very close to a deal. Darci Vetter tells Brownfield that concerns about currency manipulation and trade deficits, brought up by the National Farmers Union, are being dealt with – in OTHER forums… through the G-8, G-20 and International Monetary Fund.

NFU’s Chandler Ghoule agrees with Vetter that agriculture has done pretty well with free trade agreements, “But, Agriculture is not the only sector in there. As National Farmers Union we look at environment, we look at labor, we look at food safety, we look at – are both countries going to be benefitted from this? And, right now, we’re sitting on a 505-Billion-dollar trade deficit because of these Free Trade Agreements and that puts a 3% drag on our national GDP (gross domestic product).” The NFU also opposes Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) for the president.

However, Vetter says the trade deficits are not a good measurement of benefit. She tells Brownfield, “With some of those countries (in FTAs with the U.S.) we may have had an overall trade deficit but, I think, if you look at the movement of goods back and forth, how goods are valued and value is added to them, I’m not sure that that, in and of itself, is a measure of the economic health of our relationship.”

Japan’s Prime Minister is meeting with President Obama today in D.C. and the Trans Pacific Partnership is among the discussions.