The U.S. has not yet received anything from China that the country expects to delay its purchases of U.S. ag goods under the phase-one trade agreement due to the coronavirus situation, according to USDA Undersecretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Services Ted McKinney.
“We have not received any formal notification of a delay, which pleases me,” McKinney said in Houston, Texas, at an ethanol event. “We hope it does not come.” The length of the coronavirus situation will be important, McKinney said, particularly if it impacts shipping and other economic activities. “I suspect it will be determined by how long the issue goes on,” he noted. He also expressed a hope China would deploy additional tariff reductions to help meet the purchase commitments.
“They made the commitment and it will be difficult to meet that commitment with the current tariff schedule and conditions in place,” he said.
Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin told lawmakers during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on the Fiscal Year 2021 budget that with the coronavirus situation in China, implementation of the phase one deal “to a certain extent slowed down.”
Despite the statement by McKinney, there is the full expectation that China will request consultations, likely in March, on the issue of delaying their purchase commitments of U.S. ag goods.
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