Environment Key to U.S. Free Trade Agreement With Morocco

WASHINGTON, DC, March 3, 2004 (ENS) - Environmental safeguards are an integral part of a new U.S.-Moroccan Free Trade Agreement that the two countries say they hope will serve as a model for more trade accords in the Middle East and North Africa. Each government commits to establish high levels of environmental protection, and to not weaken or reduce its environmental laws to attract trade or investment.

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick (Photo courtesy USTR)

"It builds a very strong relationship with a longtime partner and friend, the Kingdom of Morocco," said Zoellick, "but it also serves a larger aim because together, the United States and Morocco can show many others throughout the Middle East the power of free trade to try to support democracy and promote prosperity and build a more tolerant, stable and peaceful world."

"Morocco, the first country in the world to recognize the newly sovereign United States in 1777, is a strong ally of the U.S. in the war against terror," said Zoellick. "The Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the U.S. and Morocco, negotiated in 1787, is the longest unbroken treaty relationship in the U.S. history."

Moroccan Minister Delegate Taib Fassi-Fihri (Photo courtesy Government of Morocco)

The agreement is the second U.S. free trade pact with a Muslim nation. Jordan and the United States signed an agreement on October 24, 2000 which included provisions addressing trade and environment for the first time ever in the text of a U.S. trade agreement.

Before the Morocco-U.S. Free Trade Agreement is enacted, President George W. Bush must indicate his intention to sign the accord, and the U.S. Trade Representative will have a 90 day period to discuss the document with interested congressional committees. Congress will then take up discussions on whether to ratify the agreement.

Zoellick said that while his office is faced with a tight window of opportunity to move the agreement through Congress in this election year, he believes that there is tremendous Congressional interest in seeing it pass.

U.S. pecan growers will benefit from the free trade agreement with Morocco. (Photo by Scott Bauer courtesy USDA)

Key U.S. export sectors gain immediate duty free access to Morocco, such as information technologies, machinery, construction equipment and chemicals.

Tariffs on agricultural products were a sensitive issue in the negotiations given the importance of the agricultural sector to the Moroccan economy. "We tried to deal sensitively with Morocco's special needs with its small farmers, because we believe that we can protect the social stability that is important for Morocco at the same time we expand markets for American products," Zoellick said.

Fassi-Fihri offered insight into the negotiating process. "Each time that the interests of one party coincided with sensitivities of the other party, we set out to find imaginative solutions for compromise that served the interests of both parties," he said.

Zoellick added that under the agreement, benefits would also accrue to Morocco's agricultural sector, pointing out for example, the availability of cheaper inputs such as animal feed.

"This agreement covers all agricultural products and will open Morocco's market to U.S. farm products," Zoellick said. "Poultry, beef and wheat will benefit from greater access under tariff rate quotas, and frankly this will help U.S. farmers and ranchers to get a new tool to compete against Canada and the EU in Morocco's markets," he said.

Wheat harvest on the Palouse in Washington state, one of the richest wheat growing regions in the world. (Photo courtesy USDA)

The United States will phase out all agricultural tariffs under the agreement, most in 15 years.

Environmental obligations are part of the core text of the agreement. Each government will required to effectively enforce its own domestic environmental laws, and this obligation is enforceable through the agreement's dispute settlement procedures.

Procedural guarantees that ensure fair, equitable and transparent proceedings for the administration and enforcement of environmental laws are married with provisions that promote voluntary, market based mechanisms to protect the environment, the two negotiators said.

As a complement to the agreement, the governments will sign a Joint Statement on Environmental Cooperation that will establish a Working Group on Environmental Cooperation, develop a plan of action, and set priorities for future environment related projects.

Pivot irrigation of barley fields at Berrechild, Morocco (Photo by I. Balderi courtesy FAO)

Water management has been the focus of USAID programs in Morocco to date. The Water Resources Sustainability (WRS) Project has reduced silting of a major reservoir in northern Morocco's second largest city, Tétouan. In cooperation with farmers' associations, USAID has planted 60,000 income producing olive trees, stabilized 1.5 kilometers of ravines and introduced other methods of soil erosion control.

WRS also designed and is building two model wastewater treatment plants, a chromium recycling plant in Fez and a municipal liquid waste treatment plant near Agadir. The first plant combines wastewater treatment, wastewater reuse, and production of methane. The second, a pilot wastewater treatment plant, built through the Urban Environmental Services Project, has begun operation.

The new agreement is part of the Bush administration's broader goal of establishing a Middle East Free Trade Area by 2013, Zoellick said. "It's very important to see our agreement with Morocco not just as a single announcement but as a vital step towards creating a mosaic of U.S. free trade agreements across the Middle East and North Africa."