COFTAC is a collaborative, strategic association bringing together a variety of international governments and leading businesses and associations that benefit from Free Trade Agreements with the United States.
To protect our Free Trade Agreements with the United States, COFTAC promotes open communication and stronger working partnerships between United States policymakers and FTA stakeholders. The Coalition is a tool inspiring mutually beneficial action to meet collective needs through one unified voice. COFTAC serves as a forum for FTA governments and businesses to state their needs, goals, and expectations to work cooperatively with one another and protect preferences within FTAs. Our experienced trade team has negotiated FTAs for 12countries, including in agreements like NAFTA and CAFTA-DR, as well as bilateral agreements including CBTPA, AGOA, SACU, among others.
Ultimately, the Coalition uniquely brings together industries and nations to communicate and coordinate more efficiently, strengthening public-private relations to inspire deeper partnerships and further foster economic and political success.
Members of COFTAC work together to speak as one powerful voice. By assisting each other, the unified coalition strengthens each FTA country as they negotiate with the US government.
Instead of “have unparalleled access to a tightly-knit network of governments and businesses in the US and beyond.”
COFTAC is always working to ensure the interests of FTA nations are protected and prioritized.
Keep up to date with changing policies, practices, and events in the dynamic world of international trade.
Free Trade Agreements represent decades of hard work to build trust and collaboration between countries, governments, and industries. Protecting FTAs is of the utmost importance to reduce trade barriers, build healthy economies, and maintain strong, strategic partnerships.
We see initiatives focused on the elimination of certain preferences as eroding the value and balance of our Free Trade Agreements, having the potential to threaten entire industries and even regional economies. This elimination especially threatens countries that have developed their industrial complex around the FTA framework and become interdependent on U.S. supply chains and investment.
We recognize the passing of these harmful initiatives as undermining the spirit of all trade agreements.
As countries negotiate the give-and-take of trade agreements, one preference is traded for another. If countries with duty-free on particular products lose their preference, the trade agreement is unfair. We see this threat to preferences as a catalyst for future legislation that will further eliminate preferences attained by FTA-partnering countries.
By working together, COFTAC can speak from a position of strength and work to protect each provision of the member country's Free Trade Agreement.
COFTAC is a global voice in support of countries that hold FTAs with the United States. We seek to achieve tangible benefits for members by promoting efficiency, economy, and professionalism in global trade through advocacy, forging partnerships, and advancing free trade policies. COFTAC is a global voice in support of countries that hold FTAs with the United States. We seek to achieve tangible benefits for members in global trade through advocacy and legislative action, the forging of partnerships, and advancing free trade policies.
Due to the breadth of our partnerships and policy interests, COFTAC advocates on behalf of our domestic and international stakeholders on trade policy issues before U.S. government agencies, Congress, the trade community, and international organizations.
By working with Members of Congress, we take legislative action through new amendments and bills to protect FTA preferences. Our team has passed 43 trade bills in Congress, along with preventive action to stop harmful bills that would damage the economies of FTA countries. Through the monitoring of trade-related activities of Congress, the Executive and Judicial Branch, we propose legislative and regulatory actions to improve the efficiency, transparency, and predictability of government agencies that regulate trade. We brief high-level government policymakers, providing education and communication between stakeholders and policymakers on what matters most to our FTA partners.
COFTAC is dedicated to maintaining personal, collaborative liaisons with Congressional offices and subcommittees on trade, foreign governments, federal agencies like USTR and USITC, and other government agencies that have regulatory authority or policy impact over trade between the US and FTA-holding countries.
With our expertise in international trade policy, COFTAC plays an important role in providing education to international trade compliance professionals, Congress, and foreign governments on the most pressing issues surrounding FTAs and policy. We closely monitor changes in U.S. legislation affecting tariffs, trade route and supply chain issues, intellectual property rights protection, as well as shifts in global trade dynamics, in order to provide up-to-date information to our members on the policy concerns most relevant to our FTA relationships.
