Obama Eyes Export Control Reforms to Boost Exports

(Doug Palmer — Reuters)

President Barack Obama said on Friday that updating Cold War-era restrictions on U.S. high-technology exports would help the United States create new jobs and boost economic growth. “We are losing business opportunities unnecessarily,” Obama said in a meeting with outside economic advisers just days before Secretary of Defense Roberts Gates is expected to lay out plans for revamping U.S. export controls.

U.S. manufacturers have long complained they are losing high-tech sales to competitors in Europe and Asia because of cumbersome rules designed when the United States was locked in an ideological battle with the Soviet Union.

“We’re also, I actually think, impeding effective monitoring of our national security because if you have export controls across everything you’re not spending time focusing on the handful of things that really do touch on sensitive national security,” Obama said.

Gates is expected to outline actions the administration will take to update and streamline U.S. export controls on commercial goods with potential military applications in a speech on Tuesday, as well as propose additional reforms it would like Congress to make.

“It’s going to be entirely grounded in our national security needs but I think will have a strong potential impact on where we can go in terms of exports,” Obama said. Read more here.