Help


+
Collocation
Ask AI3: What is CAFTA-DR?
Edit
Promote Demote Fix Punctuation

Sentences

On 5 September 2005, the Congress of the Dominican Republic ratified a free trade agreement with the U. S. and five Central American countries, the Dominican Republic – Central America Free Trade Agreement ( CAFTA-DR ).
CAFTA-DR entered into force for the Dominican Republic on 1 March 2007.
Industry experts from the FTZs expect that entry into force of the CAFTA-DR agreement will promote substantial growth in the FTZ sector for 2007.
The U. S. Agency for International Development ( USAID ) mission is focused on improving access of underserved populations to quality health care and combating HIV / AIDS and tuberculosis ; promoting economic growth through policy reform, support for CAFTA-DR implementation, and technical assistance to small producers and tourism groups ; environmental protection and policy reform initiatives ; improved access to quality primary, public education and assistance to at-risk youth ; a model rural electrification program ; and improving participation in democratic processes, while strengthening the judiciary and combating corruption across all sectors.
* Supporting broad-based economic growth and sustainable development and maintaining mutually beneficial trade and commercial relations, including ensuring that benefits of CAFTA-DR reach all sectors of the Guatemalan populace ;
Other leading export products are coffee, meat, cigars, sugar, ethanol, and fresh fruit and vegetables, all of which have seen remarkable growth since CAFTA-DR went into effect.
Despite important protections for investment included in CAFTA-DR, the investment climate has become relatively insecure since Ortega took office.
: Note: Within this article, " CAFTA " refers to the agreement as it stood before January 2004, and " CAFTA-DR " is used after that.
The Dominican Republic – Central America Free Trade Agreement, commonly called CAFTA-DR, is a free trade agreement ( legally a treaty under international law, but not under US law ).
In 2004, the Dominican Republic joined the negotiations, and the agreement was renamed CAFTA-DR.
CAFTA-DR together with the North American Free Trade Agreement ( NAFTA ) and active bilateral free trade agreements, including the Canada-Costa Rica Free Trade Agreement, are seen as bloc agreements instead of a Free Trade Area of the Americas ( FTAA ) agreement.
CAFTA-DR has been approved by the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the United States.
Under U. S. law, CAFTA-DR is a congressional-executive agreement.
The United States Senate approved the CAFTA-DR on June 30, 2005 by a vote of 54 – 45, and the United States House of Representatives approved the pact on July 27, 2005 by a vote of 217 – 215, with two representatives not voting.
They are all the current members of CAFTA-DR.
On May 18, 2006, Guatemala's Congress ratified CAFTA-DR and on July 1, 2006, the treaty went into effect for that country.
CAFTA-DR is also seen as a stepping stone towards the FTAA, another ( more ambitious ) free trade agreement that would encompass all the South American and Caribbean nations as well as those of North and Central America except Cuba.
As a result, CAFTA-DR does not require substantial reductions in US import duties with respect to the other countries, as the vast majority of goods produced in the participating countries already enter the US duty-free due to the US Government's Caribbean Basin Initiative.
With the addition of the Dominican Republic, the trade group's largest economy, the region covered by CAFTA-DR is the second-largest Latin American export market for US producers, behind only Mexico, buying US $ 15 billion of goods a year.
CAFTA-DR reduces tariffs, which are a form of tax.
Though supporters and opposition of CAFTA-DR contend that there are substantial gains and / or losses to be presented with the implementation of the multilateral trade agreement, results thus far are at best ambiguous.
The implications support the notion that while CAFTA-DR has eased tariffs between the trading bloc, statistically significant changes, e. g. annual averages in GDP, inflation, unemployment, agricultural imports and exports, trade volume, manufactured goods and merchandise did not rise or fall more so than in the years immediately preceding the its implementation.
Moreover, while unemployment did rise in the United States and CAFTA-DR, other economic factors have greatly affected the annual rate of unemployment in each country, namely the Great Recession of 2010, and even the recession experienced at the turn of the century.
CAFTA-DR encompasses the following components:
* Financial services: CAFTA-DR imposes rules requiring member countries to treat service suppliers of another member country no less favorably than its own suppliers or those of any other country, prohibits certain quantitative restrictions on market access of financial institutions, and bars restrictions on the nationality of senior management.

0.043 seconds.