Clinton May Seek Voluntary Steel Export Pacts

President Clinton probably will announce next week that he will seek voluntary agreements with Russia, South Korea, Japan and Brazil to limit the amount of steel they ship to the U.S., two Clinton aides and two industry officials said Thursday.

Clinton is looking at two Commerce Department plans to stem the tide of cheap steel imports coming into the U.S. market. The two Clinton aides said one plan would allow Russia to continue to export steel to the U.S., but in limited quantities at specified prices under a “suspension agreement,” and that the other would allow South Korea, Japan and Brazil to agree to self-imposed quotas. According to the aides and industry officials, Clinton has little choice but to seek voluntary controls if he doesn’t want to succumb to protectionist pressure just as he is trying to persuade Russia to adopt free-market reforms.

Treasury Secretary Robert E. Rubin said earlier in December that trade restrictions such as quotas and sanctions often “result in higher prices and less efficiency,” and that free and open trade is best for the U.S. economy.

Clinton has a congressionally imposed deadline of Tuesday to find a way to help U.S. steel companies compete. A worldwide steel glut has brought prices to their lowest levels in six years.

The imports compromise is designed to mollify industry leaders and steelworkers, but without hurting ailing economies, such as Russia’s, that Clinton has pledged to shore up, the Clinton aides said.

Industry leaders, who have called on the U.S. to impose quotas and punitive tariffs to protect American jobs, say the proposal would not go far enough.

“There have been occasions in which suspension agreements have been entered into in the past, but this time the dumping is so egregious, it would, in effect, be protecting unfair trade,” Bethlehem Steel Corp.’s Hank Barnette said in an interview. “We’re against it, and we’ve conveyed that regularly and forcefully to the government.”

However, Robert La Russa, U.S. assistant secretary of Commerce, traveled to London two weeks ago to begin negotiating a suspension agreement with the Russians. The idea was to set a specific quantity and price for Russia’s steel exports to the U.S.

The industry was concerned about the price and the shipment volume that would be the basis for any kind of agreement, said David Robertson, executive vice president of human resources and corporate law at Weirton Steel Corp. “It is not our chosen form of relief,” he said.

The Clinton aides said they expect the president to say Tuesday that he intends to negotiate with the Russians.

Right now, Moscow wants the U.S. to drop the dumping case brought against them by U.S. steelmakers last fall. U.S. industry leaders oppose such a move.