Cindy Owens

On June 3, 2020, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative released the Uniform Regulations elaborating on the rules of origin in the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (“USMCA”). As the USMCA is slated to enter into force on July 1, 2020, the Uniform Regulations reflect the three parties’ consensus on how the USMCA’s rules of origin should be interpreted, applied, and administered, with especially noteworthy provisions relating to the automotive and textile and apparel industries.

Because labor-related obligations in existing U.S. trade agreements are general and largely hortatory, few enforcement actions have been taken with regard to these obligations. The labor obligations in the Agreement between the United States of America, the United Mexican States and Canada (“USMCA” or “Agreement”), however, are specific and likely to be enforced.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was hailed as a visionary trade deal — connecting economies across the world as far as Japan and Chile, and pushing forward high standards on labour and the environment and removal of non-tariff barriers to trade. Yet political developments have meant the TPP as agreed cannot be implemented. President Trump announced the withdrawal of the United States from the TPP in January 2017.