NAFTA talks: Three scenarios and three bad outcomes

September 19, 2017

 

With NAFTA Round 3 starting this weekend in Ottawa, good news is hard to come by.

Optimism is being dimmed by a lack of common purpose among the three countries, as Canada and Mexico try to deal with U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive "America first" agenda, aimed at hammering the two smaller partners into submission.

Unlike previous trade talks under Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, and even going back to the 1910 U.S.-Canada reciprocity negotiations, there are few shared objectives with the Americans on critical issues this time around.

If there's anything positive to report, it's that three negotiating teams are diligently trying to find some areas of consensus in this brooding atmosphere, faced with the unrealistically short time-frame imposed by political circumstance. A deal must be done by early 2018 to avoid being caught up in the Mexican presidential election and the U.S. midterm elections later in the year. This weekend's negotiations will increase the pressure.

This was excerpted from the 18 September 2017 edition of The Globe and Mail.

 


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Topic(s): 
Rules of Origin & Trade Agreements / Trade Agreements
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