01 September 2010

White House Sets Out to Reform Export Controls

President Obama speaks on the U.S. economy at the White House.

Washington — President Obama has unveiled a plan to streamline and make more consistent the nation’s export controls on weapons and commercial technologies that have a potential for military use.

In a videotaped message to an August 31 export controls conference, the president said his reform will fundamentally change what is controlled and how it is controlled within a system that covers tens of thousands of items.

The president said the changes will strengthen national security by focusing the U.S. government’s efforts on the most sensitive products and technologies and by enhancing the competitiveness of key U.S. technology and manufacturing industries.

Decisions on whether an item requires an export license will be based on a single unified set of criteria, and different government lists of goods covered by export controls will be merged into a single tiered system, the White House said in an August 30 fact sheet. This system will differentiate between categories of military and commercial products based on how critical they are to the nation’s defense interests.

Of the two primary lists the U.S. government maintains, one covers items with direct warfare applications and the other includes commercial products with a potential for military use, such as encryption software and airplane parts.

An initial government evaluation of one product category — military vehicles — found that a more relaxed regime could apply to more than 70 percent of items, and export restrictions could be completely removed from one-third.

“While there is still more work to be done, taken together, these reforms will focus our resources on the threats that matter most, and help us work more effectively with our allies in the field,” Obama said.

Some U.S. allies have complained that U.S. export controls dating back to the Cold War have prevented them from buying U.S. technologies and products essential to their own and common national security interests.

U.S. manufacturers have pushed for years for the relaxation of the U.S. export control system, arguing that it undermines their global competitiveness. An interagency review the president ordered a year ago confirmed that the current system is overly complicated, contains too many redundancies and tries to protect too many items.

Obama has sought changes to export rules as part of his broader initiative to double U.S. exports in five years.

U.S. manufacturers have welcomed the proposed reform.

“These changes are the most important in at least 20 years in terms of defense, aerospace and technology exports,” said Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, a group that advocates free trade. “We’re very happy.”

The text of President Obama’s remarks and a White House fact sheet can be found on the White House website.

(This is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)