Yesterday, a deal was struck between House Democrats and the White House on the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Free Trade Agreement (USMCA). The trade deal must now be ratified by the House of Representatives and the Senate. A vote to ratify is expected next week in the House, with a Senate vote to follow later.
The RV industry has been calling for the ratification of USMCA and applauds news of a deal, the RV Industry Association stated.
RVIA encourages members of the RV industry to use the RV Action Center to email their members of Congress and ask that they support the RV industry by voting to ratify the new agreement.
The U.S. is the world’s largest producer of RVs, producing twice as many RVs as the rest of the world combined. More than 90 percent of those exports go to Canada – more than 50,000 RVs in 2017 and 33,000 in 2018. In Canada, 99 percent of RVs retailed are made in the U.S.
Mexico, while behind Canada, is also a top recipient country for RV shipments with 2 percent.
Importantly, USMCA maintains current rules of origin for RVs. While the new agreement increases the domestic content requirements for motor vehicles, the rules of origin will not change for RVs. Motorhomes will remain at 62.5 percent domestic content and travel trailers at 50 percent domestic content for duty-free treatment – the same as under current North American Free Trade Agreement rules.
USMCA also will encourage reducing technical barriers to trade between the three countries and promote regulatory coherence. Rather than burdening industry and business with duplicative, contradictory, or confusing standards and regulations, the agreement creates an inter-governmental coordinating body to promote cross border regulatory best practices, according to RVIA.
USMCA includes a process for mutual accreditation/recognition of technical regulations. Streamlining regulations and encouraging mutual recognition of standards will allow the RV industry to better compete within Canadian and Mexican markets.
