The Impact of the Andean Trade Preference Act Twelfth ... - USITC

Peru’s share of imports under ATPA dropped from 41 percent of total U.S. imports underATPA in 2001 to 22 percent in 2003, and below 20 percent in 2004 and 2005. Peru’s sharedeclined, because it did not export crude oil under the program, although it did export highvaluepetroleum derivatives, as well as significant amounts of apparel products.From the outset of ATPA, among all beneficiaries Bolivia benefited least from the program.In the course of the ATPA years, Bolivia’s share of imports under the program diminishedeven more, from 3.2 percent in 2001 to 1.6 percent in 2003 and to 1.4 percent in 2004 and2005.ColombiaColombia’s total merchandise exports rose by some 27 percent in 2005, largely because ofthe steep rise in the price of petroleum. 86 Even though Colombia’s oil reserves andproduction are on the decline, petroleum has continued to be Colombia’s single largestexport product. 87U.S. imports from Colombia under ATPA were $4.6 billion, up 20 percent from 2004 (table2-9). Colombia was the major source of nine leading products entered under the program:three petroleum products, three apparel products, two flower products, and one plasticproduct (table 2-7). These imports from Colombia were discussed earlier in the chapter.Petroleum products accounted for 72 percent of all imports under ATPA from Colombia in2005. While light crude imports (39 percent of chapter 27 imports under ATPA) continuedto outweigh heavy crude imports (29 percent of chapter 27 imports under ATPA), the gapcontinued to narrow in 2005. In terms of barrels, imports of light crude from Colombia underATPA fell by 30 percent during the year; however, higher prices pushed the value of suchimports slightly above their 2004 value. The volume of heavy crude from Colombia, afterhaving almost tripled in 2004, was up by one-half in 2005. Nonetheless, much higher pricesmade such imports more than double by value compared with 2004. Some petroleumderivatives from Colombia were also among the leading and growing imports from thatcountry under ATPA (table 2-10).Flowers were the largest category of imports from Colombia under the original ATPA, 88 buttheir relative importance was dwarfed by imports of petroleum and derivatives under theexpanded ATPA. Roses, the leading nonpetroleum import from Colombia, accounted for 4percent of all imports from that country under the expanded ATPA in 2005.86 Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), Country Report, Colombia, Apr. 2006, found at http://www.eiu.com,May 12, 2006.87 Ibid.88In its testimony at a hearing held on Feb. 10, 2004, before the United States International TradeCommission regarding a possible free trade agreement between the United States and the Andean countries,ASOCOFLORES, the Colombian Association of Flower Exporters, stated that “the current tariff preferencesfor Colombian cut flower imports under ATPA... have been aiding a critical sector of the Colombianeconomy. The Colombian floral industry is a stabilizing force in the Colombian economy.”2-21