For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
September 28, 2001
Overview
U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement (FTA)
The Jordan Free Trade Agreement (FTA) was signed on
October 24, 2000. It will take effect as America's third free trade
agreement, and the first ever with an Arab state. The FTA is the capstone
of growing U.S.-Jordanian collaboration in economic relations, which began
with close bilateral cooperation on Jordan's accession to the World Trade
Organization (WTO) and was followed by the conclusion of a trade and
investment framework agreement and a bilateral investment treaty. The FTA
serves as an example for Jordan's neighbors of the benefits of peace and
economic reform.
The Jordan FTA achieves significant and
extensive liberalization across a wide spectrum of trade
issues. It will eliminate all tariff and non-tariff barriers
to bilateral trade in virtually all industrial goods and agricultural
products within ten years.
The FTA is the first trade agreement to
include substantive provisions addressing electronic commerce, a step
that should help advance a global free trade agenda in a sector
critical to American high technology and multimedia
companies. Both countries agreed to seek to avoid imposing
customs duties on electronic transmissions, imposing unnecessary
barriers to market access for digitized products, and impeding the
ability to deliver services through electronic means. These
provisions also tie in with commitments in the services area that,
taken together, aim at encouraging investment in new technologies and
stimulating the innovative uses of networks to deliver products and
services. The agreement will significantly liberalize
bilateral trade in services across a wide range of services sectors.
The FTA's provisions on intellectual
property rights (IPR) build on the strong IPR commitments Jordan made
in acceding to the WTO. The FTA incorporates the most
up-to-date international standards for copyright protection, as well as
data exclusivity for pharmaceuticals and stepped-up commitments on
enforcement. Among other things, Jordan has undertaken to
ratify and implement the World Intellectual Property Organization's
(WIPO) Copyright Treaty and WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty
within two years. These two treaties, sometimes referred to
as the "Internet Treaties," establish several critical elements for the
protection of copyrighted works in a digital network environment,
including creators' exclusive right to make their creative works
available online, as well as Jordanian adherence to new WIPO treaties
on copyright protection in the internet.
The agreement also contains trade-related
environmental and labor provisions. These provisions will
not require either country to adopt any new labor or environmental
laws, and each country retains the right to set its own labor and
environmental standards and to change those standards. As part of the
agreement, the two countries affirm the importance of not waiving or
derogating from their labor or environmental laws in order to encourage
trade, and commit to effective enforcement of their domestic labor and
environmental laws.
The Jordan FTA places a premium on
cooperative resolution of disputes. The Governments of the United
States and Jordan exchanged letters in July 2001 acknowledging that
few, if any, differences are expected to arise in how we interpret this
Agreement, given the strong and cooperative relations between our
countries. In the very unlikely event that differences
arise, the Governments agreed in the letters that they expect to
resolve such situations through consultations and other cooperative
means, rather than through formal dispute settlement procedures.
The Jordan FTA creates a multi-step,
transparent dispute settlement process. Any dispute that
cannot be resolved through consultation may be referred to a panel of
independent experts for a non-binding opinion. If a dispute
cannot be settled after panel proceedings are completed, the FTA
authorizes the affected party to take any ?appropriate and commensurate
measure,? without specifying the form that this action should take.
However, the party taking the action may not act in a manner that is
inconsistent with its WTO obligations. Because the United
States already has a Bilateral Investment Treaty with Jordan, the FTA
does not include an investment provision.
Jordan's Trade Profile
Jordan became a member of the World Trade
Organization in April 2000. In 2000, U.S. exports to Jordan were $306
million. Jordanian exports to the United States in 2000 were
$73 million. Jordan has a population of roughly 5 million
and is bordered by Iraq, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Syria.
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