As the summer rolls on and Congress gets back in session, we expect to be hearing more about TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As is the case with trade agreements that lower barriers to free trade, IL Corn supports TPP and hopes our Congressional delegation will vote in its favor.

So what’s the deal with TPP? One of the important reasons for supporting the Trans-Pacific Partnership is to hold off on additional trade agreements between two or more countries in the Asia-Pacific region, agreements that would not include the U.S. and would put us at a trade disadvantage. This chart shows the numerous trade agreements currently in place, and illustrates that the U.S. has only three with countries in that region -- Australia, Korea and Singapore.