USITC Releases the Year in Trade 2019

On August 31, 2020, The U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) released The Year in Trade 2019, its annual overview of developments regarding the administration of U.S. trade laws and trade agreements.

The USITC's The Year in Trade is one of the government's most comprehensive reports available regarding activities related to U.S. trade policies, agreements, and trade laws. This report is the 71st in a series of annual reports submitted to the U.S. Congress under section 163(c) of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 U.S.C. 2213(c)) and its predecessor legislation.

The publication reviews U.S. international trade laws and actions under these laws, activities of the World Trade Organization (WTO), and developments regarding U.S. free trade agreements (FTAs), FTA negotiations, and U.S. bilateral trade relations with major trading partners in 2019.

The Year in Trade 2019 covers:

• all U.S. antidumping, countervailing duty, safeguard, intellectual property rights infringement, national security, and section 301 cases active in 2019.  In addition, the 2019 report covers the operation of U.S. trade preference programs, including the U.S. Generalized System of Preferences, the African Growth and Opportunity Act, the Nepal Trade Preferences Act, and the Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act, including initiatives for Haiti;


• WTO dispute settlement decisions and other significant activities in the WTO, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum;


• negotiations on U.S. FTAs with Japan, the European Union, and the United Kingdom; negotiations on modifications to the U.S.-Korea FTA and the United States-Canada-Mexico Agreement; and developments regarding the North American Free Trade Agreement and other U.S. FTAs already in effect; and


• bilateral trade issues with selected major U.S. trading partners -- the European Union, Mexico, Canada, China, Japan, South Korea, India, and Taiwan.

The report also provides an overview of U.S. trade in goods and services during 2019. Statistical tables highlight U.S. bilateral trade with major trading partners and trade under U.S. trade preference programs and FTAs.

An interactive, web-based version of The Year in Trade 2019 is also available at https://www.usitc.gov/publications/332/tradebalance.html and https://www.usitc.gov/publications/332/appendixa.html.

The Year in Trade 2019 (USITC Publication 5055, August 2020) will be posted on the USITC's Internet site at https://www.usitc.gov/publications/332/pub5055.pdf. 

Other reports in this series dating back many years can also be found on the Commission's website at https://www.usitc.gov/annual_reports_archive.