US and Chinese trade officials are \u201cclose to finalising\u201d some parts of an agreement after high-level telephone discussions yesterday, the US Trade Representative\u2019s office said, adding that deputy-level talks would proceed \u201ccontinuously.\u201d
\nIn a statement issued after the call, the USTR provided no details on the areas of progress.
\n\u201cThey made headway on specific issues and the two sides are close to finalising some sections of the agreement.
\nDiscussions will go on continuously at the deputy level, and the principals will have another call in the near future,\u201d it said.
\nThe call came as Washington and Beijing are working to agree on the text for a \u201cPhase 1\u201d trade agreement announced by US President Donald Trump on October 11.
\nTrump has said he hopes to sign the deal with China\u2019s President Xi Jinping next month at a summit in Chile.
\nBeijing was expected to request cancellation of some planned and existing US tariffs on Chinese imports during the phone call, people briefed on the negotiations told Reuters.
\nIn return, China was expected to pledge to step up its purchases of US agricultural products.
\nThe world\u2019s two largest economies are trying to calm a nearly 16-month trade war that is roiling financial markets, disrupting supply chains and slowing global economic growth.
\n\u201cThey want to make a deal very badly,\u201d Trump told reporters at the White House.\u201dThey\u2019re going to be buying much more farm products than anybody thought possible.\u201d
\nSo far, Trump has agreed only to cancel an October 15 increase in tariffs on $250bn in Chinese goods as part of understandings reached on agricultural purchases, increased access to China\u2019s financial services markets, improved protections for intellectual property rights and a currency pact.
\nBut to seal the deal, Beijing is expected to ask Washington to drop its plan to impose tariffs on $156bn worth of Chinese goods, including cell phones, laptop computers and toys, on December 15, two US-based sources told Reuters.
\nBeijing also is likely to seek removal of 15% tariffs imposed on September 1 on about $125bn of Chinese goods, one of the sources said.
\nTrump imposed the tariffs in August after a failed round of talks, effectively setting up punitive duties on nearly all of the $550bn in US imports from China.
\n\u201cThe Chinese want to get back to tariffs on just the original $250bn in goods,\u201d the source said.
\nDerek Scissors, a resident scholar and China expert at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, said the original goal of the early October talks was to finalise a text on intellectual property, agriculture and market access to pave the way for a postponement of the December 15 tariffs.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s odd that (the president) was so upbeat with (Chinese Vice-Premier) Liu He and yet we still don\u2019t have the December 15 tariffs taken off the table,\u201d Scissors said.
\nUS Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin last week said no decisions were made about the December 15 tariffs, but added: \u201cWe\u2019ll address that as we continue to have conversations.\u201d
\nIf a text can be sealed, Beijing in return would exempt some US agricultural products from tariffs, including soybeans, wheat and corn, a China-based source told Reuters.
\nBuyers would be exempt from extra tariffs for future buying and get returns for tariffs they already paid in previous purchases of the products on the list.
\nBut the ultimate amounts of China\u2019s purchases are uncertain.
\nTrump has touted purchases of $40bn to $50bn annually \u2014 far above China\u2019s 2017 purchases of $19.5bn as measured by the American Farm Bureau.
\nOne of the sources briefed on the talks said China\u2019s offer would start at around $20bn in annual purchases, largely restoring the pre-trade-war status quo, but this could rise over time.
\nPurchases also would depend on market conditions and pricing.
\nUS Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has emphasised China\u2019s agreement to remove some restrictions on US genetically modified crops and other food safety barriers, which the sources said is significant because it could pave the way for much higher US farm exports to China.
\nThe high-level call came a day after US Vice President Mike Pence railed against China\u2019s trade practices and what he termed construction of a \u201csurveillance state\u201d in a major policy speech.
\nBut Pence left the door open to a trade deal with China, saying Trump wanted a \u201cconstructive\u201d relationship with Beijing.
\nWhile the US tariffs on Chinese goods has brought China to the negotiating table to address US grievances over its trade practices and intellectual property practices, they have so far failed to lead to significant change in China\u2019s state-led economic model.
\nThe \u201cPhase 1\u201d deal will ease tensions and provide some market stability, but is expected to do little to deal with core US complaints about Chinese theft and forced transfer of American intellectual property and technology.
\nThe intellectual property rights chapter in the agreement largely deals with copyright and trademark issues and pledges to curb technology transfers that Beijing has already put into a new investment law, people familiar with the discussions said.
\nMore difficult issues, including data restrictions, China\u2019s cybersecurity regulations and industrial subsidies will be left for later phases of talks.
\nBut some China trade experts said that a completion of a Phase 1 deal could leave little incentive for China to negotiate further, especially with a US election in 2020.
\n\u201cUS-China talks change very quickly from hot to cold but, the longer it takes to nail down the easy phase 1, the harder it is to imagine a phase 2 breakthrough,\u201d said Scissors. Pages 2, 3 & 12<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
US and Chinese trade officials are \u201cclose to finalising\u201d some parts of an agreement after high-level telephone discussions yesterday, the US Trade Representative\u2019s office said, adding that deputy-level talks would proceed \u201ccontinuously.\u201d…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4433,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,17],"tags":[46,48,57,68,76,77,82,86,87,90,96,99,103,107,109,111,113,137,139,146,148,160,174,183,184,201,202,209,222,230,232,233,244,246,249,256,262,263,267,277,279,280,285,288],"class_list":["post-4427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-finance","tag-aramco","tag-athens","tag-baroudi","tag-carbon","tag-climate","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-cyprus","tag-decarbonising","tag-democracy","tag-doha","tag-eastmed","tag-egypt","tag-embargo","tag-emissions","tag-energy","tag-energy-peace","tag-gas","tag-gazprom","tag-greece","tag-greenenergy","tag-international-maritime-disputes","tag-lebanon","tag-maritime-boundaries-east-mediterranean","tag-maritime-disputes","tag-offshore","tag-oil","tag-opec","tag-pollution","tag-poverty-alleviation","tag-putin","tag-qatar","tag-rosneft","tag-roudi","tag-russia","tag-saudi","tag-solar","tag-solar-power","tag-straddling-hydrocarbons-reserves","tag-total","tag-trump","tag-turkey","tag-unclos","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}