In December this year, Jordan and the United States will
celebrate the 20th anniversary of the free trade agreement (FTA) between the
two countries going into effect, a year after it was signed.
اضافة اعلان
It is worth celebrating indeed, as the partnership has been,
without a doubt, a success story that still has potential for more
achievements, and stands out as an icon of the fruitful and strategic ties
between the two allies.
In fact, Jordan was the first Arab country to sign such a
deal with the economic giant, a fact that speaks volumes about the significance
of the Kingdom in the eyes of our US partners and friends. As always with
achievements of this caliber, the lucrative deal was championed by His Majesty
King Abdullah II with the full support of the Clinton Administration.
The figures speak for themselves: The FTA pushed up the
volume of bilateral trade exchange by 800 percent over the years, and placed
the US among the top five trade partners of Jordan. In 2020, a pandemic year,
the volume of Jordan's exports to the US stood at $1.7 billion, including $1.3
billion in garment exports alone. In 2017, the exports peaked to $3.6 billion.
The blessings are countless. Thousands of jobs have been
created, and Jordan has become a destination for investors seeking to take
advantage of the
FTA to access the US, the largest consumer market in the
world.
Have we done enough to tap this historic opportunity? This
is a question that should be left to experts and market actors to answer, but
so far so good, according to almost all the relevant literature and expert
opinions. What we are certain about is that the agreement was a lynchpin in the
Jordan-US ties, not only at the economic level, but also at the strategic and
political ones. In the words of US Ambassador to Jordan Henry Wooster, as the
two partners celebrated the 20th anniversary of signing the treaty last year,
"the US-Jordanian free trade agreement is a testament to the special
relationship between our two countries." A more important question is: Can
we do better?
Ambassador Wooster added that “the FTA is a powerful tool
with untapped potential to spur economic growth and prosperity for both our
nations. We must work together to find ways to maximize the potential the FTA
offers."
In the same online gathering, Minister of Industry, Trade,
and Supply Maha Al-Ali agreed. The FTA, she said, "continues to offer
business opportunities for both countries." Ali emphasized Jordan's
"commitment to improving government services and offer opportunities for
the private sector to grow, while focusing on assisting the companies to
overcome current challenges."
Acknowledging the existence of challenges is the best start
of the third decade in the life of the FTA. What should be done now is to find
ways to pinpoint the loopholes, and draw up a strategy with set objectives and
a fixed timeframe to address them and unleash the said potential. Jordan needs
that badly in the post-COVID era, and the US partner will also benefit from the
rectification.
Perhaps the most practical move now is to bring together all
stakeholders in a conference to discuss the future roadmap for the FTA.
Officials from both sides, members of the chambers of commerce and industry,
investors, jurists, labor leaders, environmentalists, and all others can sit
and discuss, with utter objectivity, what has gone right and what has gone
wrong and ways to capitalize on this experience to do things better.
Do not forget to invite young Jordanians and Americans to
the deliberations — business students mainly, because all of this is about them,
at the end of the day.
Read more Opinion and Analysis
.jpg)
.jpg)
