U.S. will remain in postal treaty, averting chaos
The United States GENEVA — agreed Wednesday to stay in a United Nations body that has regulated mail services for more than a century after delegates agreed during emergency talks to change the way postal fees are structured.
The Trump administration had threatened to leave the body, the Universal Postal Union, after Oct. 17 if its members did not change the system of fees that postal services charge for collection and delivery of mail and small parcels.
The administration’s primary concern has been the sliding scale of fees that allowed China, the world’s second-largest economy, to take advantage of lower rates that are available to developing countries. As a result, manufacturers in countries like China and Cambodia have been able to pay far less to send a small package to the United States than what it costs American businesses to ship them from Los Angeles to New York.
Delegates from around 140 countries stood to applaud as Bishar Hussein, head of the Universal Postal Union, said the new formula had passed, averting the threat of chaos in international mail services that only a day earlier he had warned would follow a U.S. withdrawal.
The compromise deal struck Wednesday will allow the United States to set its own postal fees beginning in July 2020 and allow other countries which receive more than 75,000 metric tons of mail a year to phase in higher rates starting in January 2021.
Hussein called the outcome “the most remarkable day in the history of the union,” the nearly 150year old organization that regulates the postal services of 192 member countries.
Peter Navarro, President Donald Trump’s trade adviser, said the decision was a “huge victory for millions of American workers and businesses” that would save the U.S. between $300 million and $500 million a year.
On Tuesday, Navarro told delegates the U.S. was prepared to leave the postal treaty, an ultimatum that reflected impatience in Washington over the slow pace of reform to a global postal system that has failed to keep up with market and economic changes or recognize the growth of China.