U.S. Wants China to Open Markets to More Imports

WASHINGTON —  The Clinton administration signaled on Wednesday that it will insist China open its markets to substantially more U.S. imports as a condition of admission to the World Trade Organization this year or in 1998.

The administration has already told China it is “strongly . . . disappointed” with that country’s refusal to reduce trade barriers and will press the issue vigorously, Commerce Secretary William M. Daley said at a breakfast with Times reporters and editors.

Although China sells almost $60 billion worth of goods in the United States each year and is enjoying an economic boom at home, American exports there have remained stagnant at last year’s level of $12 billion, U.S. officials say.

Daley said that Beijing has maintained stiff trade barriers in a broad array of products, from agriculture to high-technology goods.

“You can just about go across the board . . . and make a case for the Chinese market not being as open as it should be,” he said.

Daley’s remarks came in the wake of a major dispute in Congress over President Clinton’s proposal to continue normal trade relations with Beijing despite lawmakers’ dissatisfaction with China’s human-rights record. Clinton ultimately won by a wide margin.

Daley also confirmed that the long-expected report the White House is to issue next week on the 3 1/2-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement will conclude that the pact has produced a gain in jobs.

The administration’s report on the impact of the first years of NAFTA is expected to run more than 200 pages and to deal with a wide range of criticism from opponents who contend the pact has hurt both the United States and Mexico.

The document is partly an attempt to persuade Congress that NAFTA has worked well so far in hopes that lawmakers will be more amenable to granting the administration authority to negotiate similar accords for other countries.

Last week, Daley, a former Chicago lawyer who took the commerce job in January, fired 40 more of the department’s political appointees, fulfilling a promise to Congress that he would eliminate 100 such posts as a step toward reforming the agency.