Pages
Stay In Touch
More
© 2010 American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai Blog
On Monday, AmCham Shanghai Chairman Robert Roche, President Brenda Foster, and delegates Phil Branham, Ben Kinnas, Stephen Maloy and Steven Tseng paid a visit to the White House. At the top of the agenda was AmCham Shanghai’s latest Viewpoint U.S. Export Competitiveness in China, and a key message for this year’s delegation is support of President Obama’s National Export Initiative (NEI).
The Doorknock delegation met key officials at the White House
White House Business Council Executive Director Elizabeth Vale and Tina Tchen, Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, were particularly interested in the Viewpoint’s six recommendations to enhance U.S. competitiveness in the world’s fastest growing market. With a focus on building upon the NEI with specific, targeted actions to support U.S. companies in China, the discussion centered around AmCham Shanghai’s recommendation for a presidential-level trade mission to China and targeted U.S. Export-Import Bank financing for companies exporting to China. There was a special focus on financing for U.S. SMEs.
NEI funding must be approved by Congress, and despite the obvious importance of increasing U.S. exports and the need for the U.S. government to step up support of exports to compete with America’s export competition in China – namely, Germany, Japan and South Korea among others – getting the votes for any spending initiative in the current political environment will be tough. Elizabeth and Tina asked that AmCham Shanghai continue to advocate for NEI funding when meeting with legislators, both in D.C. and when they visit Shanghai. The delegates agreed to keep up the pressure on Congress to come through with this important funding.
Please click here to download a copy of U.S. Export Competitiveness in China.
On Thursday, the last day of the doorknock, the delegation met with Elizabeth Vale, Executive Director of the White House Business Council and Senior Advisor to Commerce Secretary Gary Locke at the White House Conference Center.
The White House Business Council is a newly formed agency under the Obama Administration tasked with ensuring that contacts with the business community are routed to the appropriate policy makers in the White House. Elizabeth made it clear to all of us that, as the Obama Administration considers the U.S. China commercial relationship a top priority, the input and feedback from the American business community in China is crucial. She urged us to continue speaking with her on matters of importance to AmCham Shanghai members and to stay in touch.
Nor Coquillard led off the discussion with an overview of our key messages on the doorknock and a run-down on who we had met with and the reception we received. Elizabeth and her team, Fred Baldessaro, Senior Advisor at the Office of Business Affairs at the Treasury Department and Dr. Kavita Patel, Policy Director at the White House, were particularly interested in data we provided regarding the trade promotion activities of our strongest competition in China – the EU nations, Japan and Korea. Also of great interest was AmCham Shanghai’s recently released China Greentech Report. We provided copies of the report and Elizabeth promised to forward it to Fred Nelson, the White House Business Council lead on the environment and technology, among others. As the Waxman-Markey climate change bill in the House is in the process of being marked up, Elizabeth asked us to provide feedback and input on the bill and on priorities for developing the greentech market in China.
