WTO Compliance Panel says US Continues to Subsidies Boeing
A
WTO panel circulated its report (DS353) on Friday 9 June on whether the US has
taken enough steps to bring its subsidies to aerospace giant Boeing in line
with global trade rules, in the latest move in the long-running row between the
US and the EU over support to their respective aviation industries.
The compliance panel specifically deemed that the US
has not yet brought into compliance one of its governmental support schemes,
while disagreeing with various aspects of the EU’s other claims.
This
ruling marks the latest development of the large civil aircraft saga, which
began nearly 13 years ago when the US asked for WTO consultations (DS316) in
2004 regarding state aid from the EU and some of its member states for Airbus,
which together with Boeing has dominated the commercial aircraft manufacturing
scene for decades.
Brussels launched the current dispute one year later,
raising its own concerns over various types of state aid being provided to
Boeing. The two cases eventually advanced to the Appellate Body stage, with the
WTO’s highest court deeming that each side had violated certain aspects of the organisation’s subsidy rules.
The
rulings are expected to be appealed, with WTO procedures requiring them to do
so within a 60-day window. Should this occur, a bilateral agreement reached in
2012 commits both sides to cooperate to enable the Appellate Body to circulate
its report to members within 90 days.
Nonetheless,
one day before the panel report, the Appellate Body chairman highlighted the
problem of delays that is currently affecting the organisation’s
dispute settlement arm, referring to difficulties such as the increasing number
of disputes that advance to the appeals stage, along with their scale and
complexity, and calling for “broad, systemic solutions.”