Britain stays satisfied {that a} complete free trade settlement with the United States makes good sense for each nations, Hands advised Reuters, though the Biden administration has put all free trade talks on ice for now.
Britain has signed trade agreements with Japan, Australia and New Zealand since leaving the European Union, and hoped to hitch the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, he added.
“Yet our largest bilateral trade partner of all, the United States, we do not have a comprehensive free trade agreement with,” he stated, noting that the 2 nations share related requirements on employee rights, the surroundings and local weather change.
Even so, Hands stated, there was progress on bilateral trade points, together with decision of a longstanding dispute over plane subsidies and suspension of U.S. tariffs on metal and aluminum.
A rising variety of U.S. states, together with Texas, are considering becoming a member of North Carolina, Indiana and now South Carolina in signing memorandums of understanding on trade, which aren’t legally binding, he stated.
Hands stated he met with California Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis this week and so they agreed to launch talks on expanded trade ties subsequent yr, with a deal with hydrogen, renewable vitality and monetary know-how, amongst different sectors. California is probably the most populous U.S. state and would rank because the world’s sixth largest economic system if it have been a rustic.
He stated he additionally met on Friday with Utah state officers and was assured of reaching a “good agreement” after resolving some “smaller outstanding issues.”
U.S. states have been eager to draw British funding, whereas increasing export alternatives was a key precedence for UK corporations, he stated, citing aerospace and know-how as different promising sectors for expanded trade ties.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Leslie Adler)
By Andrea Shalal
