Deepening NAFTA

Luckily, a road map for NAFTA exists.

Aren t both members of NAFTA?

Today's challenge is to renew NAFTA by adding the concept of partnership to it.

The good news about NAFTA is that there is little news about NAFTA.

South Korea, in particular, is left to wonder whether or not the US is serious about pursuing similar trade agreements with one of Asia s strongest economies and one of America s oldest regional allies.

As Democrats suggest renegotiating NAFTA, Asian countries are watching with increasing trepidation.

Indeed, Northeast Asia would become the third major axis of regional economic integration, following the EU and NAFTA.

NAFTA brought with it a spectacular increase in Mexican exports, as well as a dramatic shift in their composition.

NAFTA 20 years ago, and Peña Nieto s reforms now, are necessary but insufficient conditions for progress.

In the context of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the resulting increase in manufacturing competitiveness promises to boost Mexico s growth substantially.

As former Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon observed in 2008, To a certain extent, we're armoring NAFTA.

This requires greater communication between and among decision makers in all three NAFTA members.

Since its founding in 1994, NAFTA has been characterized (at best) by a bilateral management of issues and problems.

Opening the energy sector completes the agenda of economic integration that began when NAFTA was approved in 1994.

That quiet, so different from the protests that greeted the North American Free Trade Area's creation a decade ago, reflects NAFTA's clear achievement in facilitating and integrating economic exchange among its three partners. Next week's meeting between the Mexican and American presidents should take advantage of this success to push NAFTA forward in creative new ways.

This requires greater communication between and among decision makers in all three NAFTA members. The agenda and timetable for convergence must be set by NAFTA's elected leaders, but implementation should be in the hands of a new commission.

Next week's meeting between the Mexican and American presidents should take advantage of this success to push NAFTA forward in creative new ways.

The agenda and timetable for convergence must be set by NAFTA's elected leaders, but implementation should be in the hands of a new commission.

Having excluded energy from the original NAFTA talks, Canada and Mexico are now willing to engage with the US on a common energy strategy.

In the United States, presidential candidates appeal to anxious voters by blaming the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) for the erosion of the country s manufacturing base.

For NAFTA to realize its full potential and move the convergence process, opening borders to trade and reducing tariff barriers are not enough.

Mexico s manufactured exports have increased tenfold since NAFTA began, with roughly 80 now going to the US.

Young nations such as Mexico and Turkey should be particularly careful, due to their strong economic ties with NAFTA and the EU, where the gradual aging of populations is well under way.

Having created a functioning, regional, open trade area, the three countries must ensure that the new imperative to secure borders does not obstruct legitimate flows of goods, services and people. A NAFTA wide security perimeter could transform internal borders in much the same way that the Schengen Agreement transformed borders within much of continental Europe.

Since NAFTA was signed in December 1992, Mexico s economy has grown at an average annual rate of barely over 1 in per capita terms.

Although his unorthodox suggestion met with skepticism, his ideas established an agenda that NAFTA's three partners should pursue.

A NAFTA wide security perimeter could transform internal borders in much the same way that the Schengen Agreement transformed borders within much of continental Europe.

The key to the competitiveness of Saudi Arabia's petrochemical industry was its use of natural gas and ethane, which was far less expensive than the oil product naphtha on which its global competitors depended.

But if the proposals discussed in Beijing last month are realized, the resulting FTA could surpass NAFTA in its degree of integration and importance to the world economy.

Because, from Mexico's perspective, NAFTA has not yet achieved one of its key goals to deliver the benefits of free trade to all of the country's regions and sectors.

Instead, their campaigns treatment of US foreign policy has been reduced to endless debates about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and about the wisdom of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

While the European Commission model may not be what NAFTA needs, the governments of Canada, Mexico, and the US should establish a permanent mechanism for channeling ideas and proposals, and transforming those ideas into action.

The Canada United States Free Trade Agreement (FTA) of 1988 eliminated tariffs between the two countries, while the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) expanded the free trade zone to include Mexico in 1994.

That quiet, so different from the protests that greeted the North American Free Trade Area's creation a decade ago, reflects NAFTA's clear achievement in facilitating and integrating economic exchange among its three partners.

On the contrary, what is surprising is that President Clinton was so willing to swim against the tide generated by his own labor protectionist base in 1993 and 1994 and establish NAFTA and the WTO.