NewsWhore
06-07-2006, 03:13 PM
The US government is demanding that Congress pass a government procurement bill prior to the start-up of the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement. Another request, as reported in El Caribe, is that Dominican telecom companies enable mobile phone customers to use the same telephone number regardless of where they are located.
But, apparently it is the last minute demand made by the United States in relation to protection for medicines that has complicated the process. The United States wants to modify what was agreed upon in negotiations leading to the approval of DR-CAFTA to allow for five more years of protection for pharmaceuticals with secret data. According to an executive summary obtained by El Caribe, Vilma Arbaje the DR Trade Representative, "the position of the United States is categorical on this point: there will be no DR-CAFTA if this is not accepted." The commission points out that the Dominican Pharmaceutical Industry (INFADOMI) had expressed their opposition to this protection since it removed the possibility of producing medicines.
In today's edition of Hoy, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Francisco Javier Garcia told reporters that DR-CAFTA would start on the first of July, as agreed. He dismissed the gestures being made by lobbyists in the United States to require the DR to modify Law 173 that protects importers and representatives of foreign manufacturers.
The Dominican government benefits from the delaying of the implementation of DR-CAFTA. As reported in the press, if the treaty is again delayed the government could receive an additional windfall of RD$2.35 billion in tax revenues. The government lobbies and secured through Congress a tax reform that sought to compensate it for import tax duties that would have been eliminated if the treaty had gone into effect on 1 January 2006 as originally planned.
Link To Original Article (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#7)
But, apparently it is the last minute demand made by the United States in relation to protection for medicines that has complicated the process. The United States wants to modify what was agreed upon in negotiations leading to the approval of DR-CAFTA to allow for five more years of protection for pharmaceuticals with secret data. According to an executive summary obtained by El Caribe, Vilma Arbaje the DR Trade Representative, "the position of the United States is categorical on this point: there will be no DR-CAFTA if this is not accepted." The commission points out that the Dominican Pharmaceutical Industry (INFADOMI) had expressed their opposition to this protection since it removed the possibility of producing medicines.
In today's edition of Hoy, the Minister for Industry and Commerce, Francisco Javier Garcia told reporters that DR-CAFTA would start on the first of July, as agreed. He dismissed the gestures being made by lobbyists in the United States to require the DR to modify Law 173 that protects importers and representatives of foreign manufacturers.
The Dominican government benefits from the delaying of the implementation of DR-CAFTA. As reported in the press, if the treaty is again delayed the government could receive an additional windfall of RD$2.35 billion in tax revenues. The government lobbies and secured through Congress a tax reform that sought to compensate it for import tax duties that would have been eliminated if the treaty had gone into effect on 1 January 2006 as originally planned.
Link To Original Article (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#7)