Office of the United States Trade Representative August 21, 2017 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

Section 3(e) of the Presidential Executive Order on Buy American and Hire American directs the Secretary of Commerce and the United States Trade Representative to assess the impacts of all United States free trade agreements and the World Trade Organization Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA) on the operation of Buy American Laws, including their impacts on the implementation of domestic procurement preferences. The Executive Order can be found here: https:// www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/04/18/presidential-e xecutive- order-buy-american-and-hire-american. In response to this Executive Order, the Department of Commerce (Department) and the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) are conducting industry outreach in order to better understand how the U.S. government procurement obligations under all U.S. free trade agreements and the GPA affect U.S. manufacturers' and suppliers' access to and participation in the domestic government procurement process. In addition, because reciprocal access to trading partners' markets is an important motivation for including government procurement obligations in U.S. free trade agreements and for the United States' membership in the GPA, the Department and the USTR are also seeking information about the costs and benefits of these obligations to U.S. manufacturers and suppliers competing in U.S. trading partners' government procurement markets. The trading partners with which the United States has international government procurement obligations are: Armenia, Aruba, Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Chile, Chinese Taipei (Taiwan), Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, the European Union (which includes Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom), Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Liechtenstein, Mexico, the Republic of Moldova, Montenegro, Morocco, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Oman, Panama, Peru, Singapore, Switzerland, and Ukraine. The Secretary of Commerce and the United States Trade Representative are required to conclude the assessment called for under Section 3(e) by September 15, 2017. Responses to this notice will be considered in the assessment as well as in the final report of findings and recommendations to strengthen the implementation of Buy American Laws that the Secretary of Commerce will submit to the President of the United States by November 24, 2017.