Request for Comments on Significant Foreign Trade Barriers for the 2023 National Trade Estimate Report, 56741-56743 [2022-19896]

Agencies

• Office of the United States Trade Representative

[Federal Register Volume 87, Number 178 (Thursday, September 15, 2022)]
[Notices]
[Pages 56741-56743]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2022-19896]


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OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE

[Docket Number USTR-2022-0013]


Request for Comments on Significant Foreign Trade Barriers for 
the 2023 National Trade Estimate Report

AGENCY: Office of the United States Trade Representative.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), 
through the Trade Policy Staff Committee (TPSC), publishes the National 
Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE Report) each year. 
USTR invites comments to assist it and the TPSC in identifying 
significant foreign barriers to, or distortions of, U.S. exports of 
goods and services, U.S. foreign direct investment, and U.S. electronic 
commerce for inclusion in the NTE Report. USTR also will consider 
responses to this notice as part of the annual review of the operation 
and effectiveness of all U.S. trade agreements regarding 
telecommunications products and services that are in force with respect 
to the United States.

DATES: The deadline for submission of comments is Friday, October 28, 
2022, at 11:59 p.m. ET.

ADDRESSES: USTR strongly prefers electronic submissions made through 
the Federal eRulemaking Portal: https://www.regulations.gov 
(Regulations.gov). The instructions for submitting comments are in 
section IV below. The docket number is USTR-2022-0013. For alternatives 
to online submissions, please contact Spencer Smith at 
[email protected] or (202) 395-2974 in advance of the 
deadline.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Spencer Smith at 
[email protected] or (202) 395-2974.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Background

    Section 181 of the Trade Act of 1974, as amended (19 U.S.C. 2241), 
requires USTR annually to publish the NTE Report, which sets out an 
inventory of significant foreign barriers to, or distortions of, U.S. 
exports of goods and services, including agricultural commodities and 
U.S. intellectual property; foreign direct investment by U.S. persons, 
especially if such investment has implications for trade in goods or 
services; and U.S. electronic commerce. The inventory facilitates U.S. 
negotiations aimed at reducing or eliminating these barriers and is a 
valuable tool in enforcing U.S. trade laws and agreements and 
strengthening the rules-based trading system. You can find the 2022 NTE 
Report on USTR's website at https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/reports-and-publications/2022. To ensure compliance with 
the statutory mandate for the NTE Report and the Administration's 
commitment to focus on significant foreign trade barriers, USTR will 
take into account comments in response to this notice when deciding 
which significant barriers to include in the NTE Report.

II. Topics on Which the TPSC Seeks Information

    To assist USTR in preparing the NTE Report, commenters should 
submit information related to one or more of the following categories 
of foreign trade barriers:
    1. Import policies. Examples include tariffs and other import 
charges, quantitative restrictions, import licensing, pre-shipment 
inspection, customs barriers and shortcomings in trade facilitation or 
in valuation practices, and other market access barriers.
    2. Technical barriers to trade. Examples include unnecessarily 
trade restrictive or discriminatory standards, conformity assessment 
procedures, labeling, or technical regulations, including unnecessary 
or discriminatory technical regulations or standards for 
telecommunications products.
    3. Sanitary and phytosanitary measures. Examples include measures 
relating to food safety, or animal and plant life or health that are 
unnecessarily trade restrictive, discriminatory, or not based on 
scientific evidence.
    4. Government procurement restrictions. Examples include closed 
bidding and bidding processes that lack transparency.
    5. Intellectual property protection. Examples include inadequate 
patent, copyright, and trademark regimes, trade secret theft, and 
inadequate enforcement of intellectual property rights.
    6. Services. Examples include prohibitions or restrictions on 
foreign participation in the market, discriminatory licensing 
requirements or standards, local-presence requirements, and 
unreasonable restrictions on what services may be offered.
    7. Digital trade and electronic commerce. Examples include barriers 
to cross-border data flows, including data localization requirements, 
discriminatory practices affecting trade in digital products, 
restrictions on the supply of internet-enabled services, and

[[Page 56742]]

other restrictive technology requirements.
    8. Investment. Examples include limitations on foreign equity 
participation and on access to foreign government-funded research and 
development programs, local content requirements, technology transfer 
requirements and export performance requirements, and restrictions on 
repatriation of earnings, capital, fees, and royalties.
    9. Subsidies, especially export subsidies and local content 
subsidies. Examples of export subsidies include subsidies contingent 
upon export performance, and agricultural export subsidies that 
displace U.S. exports in third country markets. Examples of local 
content subsidies include subsidies contingent on the purchase or use 
of domestic rather than imported goods.
    10. Competition. Examples include government-tolerated 
anticompetitive conduct of state-owned or private firms that restricts 
the sale or purchase of U.S. goods or services in the foreign country's 
markets or abuse of competition laws to inhibit trade, and fairness and 
due process concerns by companies involved in competition investigatory 
and enforcement proceedings in the country.
    11. State-owned enterprises (SOEs). Examples include actions by 
SOEs and by governments with respect to SOEs involved in the 
manufacture or production of non-agricultural goods or in the supply of 
services that constitute significant barriers to, or distortions of, 
U.S. exports of goods and services, U.S. investments, or U.S. 
electronic commerce, which may negatively affect U.S. firms and 
workers, such as subsidies and non-commercial advantages provided to 
and from SOEs; practices with respect to SOEs that discriminate against 
U.S. goods or services; or actions by SOEs that are inconsistent with 
commercial considerations in the purchase and sale of goods and 
services.
    12. Labor. Examples include concerns with failures by a government 
to protect internationally recognized worker rights or to eliminate 
discrimination in respect of employment or occupation, in cases where 
these failures influence trade flows or investment decisions in ways 
that constitute significant barriers to, or distortions of, U.S. 
exports of goods and services, U.S. investment, or U.S. electronic 
commerce, which may negatively affect U.S. firms and workers. 
Internationally recognized worker rights include the right of 
association; the right to organize and bargain collectively; a 
prohibition on the use of any form of forced or compulsory labor; a 
minimum age for the employment of children, and a prohibition on the 
worst forms of child labor; and acceptable conditions of work with 
respect to minimum wages, hours of work, and occupational safety and 
health.
    13. Environment. Examples include concerns with a government's 
levels of environmental protection, unsustainable stewardship of 
natural resources, and harmful environmental practices that constitute 
significant barriers to, or distortions of, U.S. exports of goods and 
services, U.S. investment, or U.S. electronic commerce, which may 
negatively affect U.S. firms or workers.
    14. Other barriers. Examples include significant barriers or 
distortions that are not covered in any other category above or that 
encompass more than one category, such as bribery and corruption, or 
that affect a single sector.
    Please provide, if available, the titles of relevant laws or 
measures and a description of the concerns with which the laws or 
measures relate to the significant foreign barriers or distortions 
identified. Commenters should place particular emphasis on any 
practices that may violate U.S. trade agreements. USTR also is 
interested in receiving new or updated information pertinent to the 
barriers covered in the 2022 NTE Report as well as information on new 
barriers. If USTR does not include in the 2023 NTE Report information 
that it receives pursuant to this notice, it will maintain the 
information for potential use in future discussions or negotiations 
with trading partners.
    Commenters should submit information related to one or more of the 
following export markets to be covered in the report: Algeria, Angola, 
the Arab League, Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bolivia, 
Brazil, Brunei, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, 
Cote d'Ivoire, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, 
Ethiopia, the European Union, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, 
India, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Korea, Kuwait, Laos, 
Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Norway, 
Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, Qatar, Russia, 
Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, 
Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, 
Uruguay, and Vietnam. Commenters may submit information related to 
significant barriers or distortions in export markets other than those 
listed in this paragraph.
    In addition, section 1377 of the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness 
Act of 1988 (19 U.S.C. 3106) (Section 1377) requires USTR annually to 
review the operation and effectiveness of U.S. telecommunications trade 
agreements that are in force with respect to the United States. The 
purpose of the review is to determine whether any foreign government 
that is a party to one of those agreements is failing to comply with 
that government's obligations or is otherwise denying, within the 
context of a relevant agreement, ``mutually advantageous market 
opportunities'' to U.S. telecommunication products or services 
suppliers. USTR will consider responses to this notice in the review 
called for in Section 1377 and highlight both ongoing and emerging 
barriers to U.S. telecommunication services and goods exports in the 
2023 NTE Report.

III. Estimate of Increase in Exports

    To the extent possible, each comment should include an estimate of 
the potential increase in U.S. exports of goods or services, foreign 
direct investment, or electronic commerce that would result from 
removing any significant foreign trade barrier the comment identifies, 
as well as a description of the methodology the commenter used to 
derive the estimate. Commenters should express estimates within the 
following value ranges: less than $25 million; $25 million to $100 
million; $100 million to $500 million; and over $500 million.

IV. Requirements for Submissions

    Comments must be in English and must identify on the first page of 
the submission `Comments Regarding Foreign Trade Barriers to U.S. 
Exports for 2023 Reporting--[Name of country or countries discussed]'. 
Commenters providing information on foreign trade barriers in more than 
one country should, whenever possible, provide a separate attachment 
for each country as part of the same submission. USTR strongly 
encourages commenters to provide only one submission.
    The submission deadline is Friday, October 28, 2022 at 11:59 p.m. 
ET. USTR strongly encourages commenters to make online submissions, 
using Regulations.gov. To submit comments via Regulations.gov, enter 
docket number USTR-2022-0013 on the home page and click `search.' The 
site will provide a search-results page listing all documents 
associated with this docket. Find a reference to this notice and click 
on the link entitled `comment.' For further information on using 
Regulations.gov, please consult the resources provided on the website 
by clicking on `How to Use Regulations.gov' on the bottom of the home 
page.

[[Page 56743]]

    Regulations.gov allows users to submit comments by filling in a 
`type comment' field, or by attaching a document using an `upload file' 
field. USTR prefers that you provide comments in an attached document. 
If you attach a document, please identify the name of the country to 
which the submission pertains in the `type comment' field, e.g., see 
attached comments with respect to (name of country). USTR prefers 
submissions in Microsoft Word (.doc) or Adobe Acrobat (.pdf). If you 
use an application other than those two, please indicate the name of 
the application in the `type comment' field.
    Filers submitting comments that do not contain business 
confidential information (BCI) should name their file using the name of 
the person or entity submitting the comment, and the name of the 
country or countries discussed. For any comments submitted 
electronically that contain BCI, the file name of the business 
confidential version should begin with the characters `BCI.' Clearly 
mark any page containing BCI with `BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL' on the top of 
that page. Filers of submissions containing BCI also must submit a 
public version of their comments that USTR will place in the docket for 
public inspection. The file name of the public version should begin 
with the character `P.' Follow the `BCI' and `P' with the name of the 
person or entity submitting the comments.
    USTR will post comments in the docket for public inspection, except 
properly designated BCI. You can view comments on Regulations.gov by 
entering docket number USTR-2022-0013 in the search field on the home 
page. General information concerning USTR is available at https://www.ustr.gov.

William Shpiece,
Chair of the Trade Policy Staff Committee, Office of the United States 
Trade Representative.
[FR Doc. 2022-19896 Filed 9-14-22; 8:45 am]
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