Washington, March 8:

Australia pressed the United States to grant more access in sensitive commercial areas as the two countries held their first review of a landmark free trade pact.

US Trade Representative Rob Portman and Australian trade minister Mark Vaile said the FTA, which took effect in January 2005, had lent a major boost to each nation’s exporters.

“We’ve seen a substantial jump in exports of US goods, including beef, fresh and processed fruit and vegetables, rice, wine, machinery, including electrical machinery, trucks and parts, and aircraft,” Portman said.

“This is great news for US businesses, workers, farmers and ranchers as well as Australian consumers.” Vaile also acclaimed the benefits of the FTA, which contributed to two-way trade between Australia and US growing six per cent last year.

But he noted that Australia had been unable to scrap US quotas on its sugar exports under the FTA, given US reluctance to allow in greater competition to its heavily protected sugar industry.

“That structure is there, it’s not to be re-litigated, if you like. But being a dynamic arrangement, there’s an economic relationship that we want to continue to expand,” Vaile said.

“We’ve always said that it’s a living, breathing, dynamic agreement. “We continue to look for ways to improve that and to improve market access across a range of areas,” he said, citing sugar along with professional and financial services, government procurement and standards for farm produce.

Portman said the United States, fearing a sugar shortage last year, had relaxed its barriers to allow imports of raw Australian sugar to rise 59 per cent.

“The point is that we will be flexible where we can, but reopening the FTA is not a practical alternative,” he said.

The two officials also discussed an amendment to the FTA pushed through by Australia’s Labor opposition that slaps heavy fines against drug companies if they try to stop the sale of cheap pharmaceuticals by lodging spurious patents.

Portman said he stressed to Vaile that “innovation, transparency, ought to be key not just in terms of pharmaceutical policy but in terms of intellectual policy”.

The trade chiefs also discussed the fate of Australia’s monopoly wheat exporter, the AWB, which is accused of paying huge bribes to Saddam Hussein’s regime.

Both US and European Union have pressed Australia to drop its monopoly marketing system for wheat, as part of the World Trade Organisation’s Doha round of liberalisation talks.