trade and economy

 

Leo Varadkar: Trade Is The Bedrock Of Our Economy – We Need To Stop Taking It For Granted

Many countries owe their wealth and prosperity to natural resources like coal, oil, gas and precious metals.

Others grow rich through conquest and colonialism. Some choose to do both.

Ireland has no history of conquest, and no legacy as a coloniser. Our natural resources are limited largely to our landscape, agriculture, and to wind and wave.

Yet in a world of almost 200 nations, Ireland is consistently ranked in the top 10 or 20 in terms of prosperity and high living standards. This is because our prosperity is down to our land and our people, our natural pool of talent and ability. We produce this talent in Ireland and sell it around the world.

It’s easy to forget just how much we depend on trade. Our success and living standards are based on a formula of trading goods and services internationally, our attractiveness as a place to invest and our ability to enter into international free trade agreements with other countries.

This formula is strengthened by our position at the heart of the European Union, its single market and the euro zone.

We will not remain successful by standing still. We have to get ahead of the next wave and catch it

Day in, day out, our enterprise agencies, officials and diplomats reinforce this formula.

We literally cannot afford to take it for granted, especially in a world that is changing before our eyes, which has seen a return of protectionism in some quarters, and a return to conquest and colonialism in others.

Covid, Brexit, international tax reforms, new technology, the need to take radical action to reduce our emissions and Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine have all caused huge disruption to trade over the past few years. They have redefined future risks, challenges and opportunities of doing trade into the future.

Still, as Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, I find myself in the strange position that trade policy is rarely debated in the Dáil and when it is, it’s not to debate how to grow trade.

This leaves me concerned that many take Ireland’s recent economic success for granted. We need to ensure that Irish companies will continue to expand, that trade and employment will grow, that we will attract more investment from overseas and that we will have the skills and talent to underpin that model for years to come.

We should be talking about this and debating it. We will not remain successful by standing still. We have to get ahead of the next wave and catch it.

In a world that is changing before our very eyes, it’s right that we think about and plan for the long term.

So it’s timely to publish a new Trade and Investment Strategy: Value for Ireland, Values for the World.

This new strategy, which will be published later this week, sets out our plans for trade and investment, and climate and sustainability: our principled and holistic approach to trade policy.

I will chair a new cross-government and cross-agency trade and investment council to oversee implementation of the strategy, and its seven priority actions.

They include:

- Attending to our broader ecosystem to maintain and enhance our competitiveness, to grow Irish-owned business, attract FDI and maintain high standards of living

- Establishing an expert group on global value chains and supply chains to identify global supply chain opportunities and threats. The group will examine themes such as economic nationalism, open strategic autonomy, and ‘re-shoring’ initiatives

- Launching a Government of Ireland communications campaign to highlight the benefits of international trade and investment to a broader Irish domestic audience and foster a deeper understanding of the important role that trade and investment plays in providing jobs and to promote Ireland’s and the EU’s wider interests, including our values, principles and standards.

- One ‘whole-of-government’ trade mission annually.

- Making businesses more aware of our network of free trade agreements and tax treaties.

This new strategy is a chance for us to look at the changed global landscape, and the implications it has for trade.

Record levels of trade cannot be taken for granted. Maintaining and expanding global trade in a principled way will continue to be essential to Ireland’s economic wellbeing, living standards and sustainable development.

Leo Varadkar is Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade & Employment

“Mongolia Needs To Carry Out Budget And Trade Reforms”

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/. Global Director of the World Bank Group's Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment Global Practice Marcello Estevao, who attended the ‘Mongolia Economic Forum-2022’ as an honorable guest, was interviewed about the current state of Mongolia’s economy and trade.

According to the report released by the World Bank, regional countries including Mongolia are able to overcome challenges through the budget and trade reforms. What reforms are necessary to be made?

-Budget and trade reforms are a must. However, it is difficult to solve this problem in Mongolia today. Although the pandemic situation is calming down, the country faces new difficulties caused by the Russia-Ukraine crisis. Furthermore, the continued border closure with China negatively affects the Mongolian economy. I hope that the situation will get better soon. Regardless of the situation, the reforms are required to be made.

 

-How to make the economy more accessible to society in the current situation?

A key to making the economy more accessible is to maintain the economic growth as much as possible. It is important to ensure economic growth continuously. Economic accessibility is connected to export and foreign trade. Making efforts for reviving the economy will minimize economic dependence on other external factors. Support should be provided only to target group of the society. 

 

Greg Abbott’s Call For More Vehicle Inspections At The Border Is Causing Delays And Supply Chain Issues, Locals Say

Commercial vehicles go through the U.S. Customs and Border Protection for inspection before entering El Paso from Ciudad Juárez at the Bridge of the Americas on Friday.

Commercial vehicles trying to enter the United States to deliver products from Mexico have been backed up for hours at Texas ports of entry following Gov. Greg Abbott’s directive on Wednesday that state troopers increase inspections.

“This continues to add disruption to our supply chain,” said Ermilo Richer, the owner of a 100-year-old logistics company in Laredo who said his trucks were taking between four and five hours to cross from Mexico. “It’s just something we don’t need right now.”

Abbott’s order is part of his push to stiffen security at the state’s southern border as the Biden administration in Washington, D.C., plans to end a pandemic-era emergency health order that had allowed federal officials to turn away migrants, even those seeking asylum. But officials in cities that depend on cross-border trade as economic engines fear negative impacts that the increased vehicle inspections could have.

“We value border security but it’s got to be weighed very carefully with the Texas economy,” said Laredo Mayor Pete Saenz. “Any slowdown in commerce at our bridges is a definite slowdown in our economy.”

On Friday afternoon, U.S. Customs and Border Protection showed five-hour delays for entry into Laredo through the Laredo-Colombia Solidarity International Bridge. The port of entry in Pharr had delays of more than four hours. El Paso’s two inland ports had delays of three hours.

Neither the Texas Department of Public Safety nor Abbott’s office responded to requests for comment.

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On Abbott’s order, DPS troopers appear to be checking every one of the thousands of commercial vehicles that cross selected ports, local officials said. The trucks are pulled over to DPS checkpoints after they are inspected by CBP at the international port of entry. Abbott said he is targeting commercial vehicles because drug cartels use them to smuggle humans and drugs into Texas.

 On Friday afternoon, U.S. Customs and Border Protection showed El Paso’s two inland ports had delays of three hours. Credit: Ivan Pierre Aguirre for The Texas Tribune

But DPS troopers can conduct only mechanical inspections, leading some, like U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, to question the efficacy of Abbott’s orders. He said DPS had told federal officials they intended to check every vehicle and each inspection could take about 45 minutes.

“I don’t know what the rationale is,” Cuellar said. “If you’re worried about too many people coming in but you can’t inspect the cargo, that doesn’t accomplish anything except make things uncomfortable and have a negative impact on commerce.”

David Coronado, managing director for international bridges and economic development in El Paso, said between 2,500 and 3,000 trucks flow between Ciudad Juárez and El Paso every day. It’s those businesses and the companies they’re servicing who will suffer because of the delays.

“The major impact right now is on trade and what it’s doing to the business community in El Paso and Juárez,” he said.

Mexico is Texas’ top trading partner, doing $442 billion in total trade last year. That trade includes automobile parts that move back and forth across the border, machinery, electric equipment, plastics and produce.

As the United States continues to struggle with supply chain problems, border residents steeped in the importance of cross-border trade worry about the impact on the country’s broader economy.

In a Friday statement, the Texas International Produce Association said commercial trucks crossing the Rio Grande’s Pharr International Bridges waited in miles-long lines until early Friday morning, causing supply chain issues across the country.

Dante L. Galeazzi, TIPA CEO and president, said his association fears businesses will move out of Texas to neighboring Mexico and Arizona.

“Warehouses have staff sitting idle, with no trucks to unload. Buyers in other parts of the country cannot understand why their product is not available. US trucking companies are losing money as they sit around for days with no loads to haul,” he said. “This is destroying our business and the reputation of Texas.”

Cuellar said the goods crossed through Texas’ ports go across the country, including popular produce like avocados and tomatoes, as well as parts for the auto industry in Michigan.

“The chain of supplies we have will affect wherever these companies may have their base,” he said. “This is going to add to the pandemic chain of supply problems we’ve been having and will be man-made by the governor.”

U.S. Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-McAllen, joined Cuellar in decrying Abbott’s move as “impractical and detrimental to our local economy.”

“Our state and our nation depend on the reliable, uninterrupted flow of goods to meet our nation’s needs. By implementing this action, Governor Abbott is exacerbating the supply chain crisis to further his crusade at the border,” Gonzalez said in a statement. “In halting legitimate trade, he is hurting Texans – the people he was elected to serve. I urge the governor to rescind this action immediately and restore normal operations along the southern border.”

Abbott, a Republican who is seeking a third term in November, is pushing to win over Latino support in South Texas for his reelection bid. He’s railed against the Biden administration’s inaction on immigration to win over some supporters in that area of the state and said he was increasing vehicle inspections in response to Biden’s planned cancellation of Title 42, the pandemic-era order that allowed officials to turn people away at the border.

But in doing so, he may be turning off some of the voters he’s trying to win over.

“I know Gov. Abbott is right now really focused on Title 42 that Washington wants to cancel. I understand his frustration with Washington. But that’s another issue,” Richer said. “We definitely need to make sure Washington figures out how to keep Title 42 open and control immigration but we need Gov. Abbott to make the right calls and not affect a community that’s got nothing to do with immigration.”

Cuellar, the Laredo Democrat, is one of a handful in his party who also support keeping the emergency health order in place. But he said Abbott’s response to the Biden administration will hurt only border communities that depend on cross-border trade.

He was already fielding nervous calls from constituents and he encouraged them to voice their concerns to Abbott.

“The best thing to do is to let the governor know that what he’s doing is not accomplishing what he wants,” he said. “I don’t know what this has to do with Title 42. This is impacting trade, commerce.”

Jason Beeferman contributed to this story.

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