The Senate yesterday approved the U.S./Peru Free Trade Agreement (FTA), sending the measure to the President for his signature.   

Flowers exported from Peru to the United States currently enter the U.S. duty-free under the Andean Trade Preference Act (ATPA).  The ATPA has to be renewed periodically, but the President's signature on the U.S./Peru FTA grants permanent duty-free status to flowers from Peru.

Other pending trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea will not be considered by Congress this year.

Peru imported about $256,000 in nursery and greenhouse products from the U.S. in 2006 compared to $1.3 million by Colombia. 

The U.S. imported approximately $3.8 million in cut flowers from Peru in 2006, up from $2.3 million in 2001 and about the same value as in 2005. In 2006 these imports accounted for less than one percent of the $596.8 million in cut flowers imported from South America, mostly from Colombia ($448.6 million) and Ecuador ($141.4 million).

In a news conference Dec. 4, President Bush urged approval of the Colombian measure saying, "If the Congress does not pass the free-trade agreement with Colombia, it will be a destabilizing moment."

He explained that U.S. support for a Colombian trade agreement will help counter the influence of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

The ATPA is set to expire on February 29, 2008. If a trade agreement with Colombia is not signed by then, or if the ATPA is not extended, importers of record will have to pay duties on flowers coming into the United States from Colombia. The situation is similar for flowers from Ecuador. The primary difference, however, is that there is no trade agreement currently pending or being negotiated between the United States and Ecuador.

--Drew Gruenburg
dgruenburg@safnow.org

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