NAFTZ names trade advocate as new head

The National Association of Foreign-Trade Zones (NAFTZ) announced that Daniel Griswold, a nationally recognized advocate for open trade and economic expansion, has been appointed NAFTZ President, effective this week.

A graduate of the London School of Economics and author of the popular 2009 book Mad about Trade: Why Main Street America Should Embrace Globalization, Griswold has for many years been a prolific and enthusiastic free-trade advocate and author from his position as Director of the Center for Trade Policy Studies at the Cato Institute in Washington.

Griswold succeeds Dr. Willard M. Berry, who served as NAFTZ president from 2004 until his retirement in November 2011.

In an interview with LM, Griswold said his first goal will be make FTZ more competitive and “user friendly.”

With over 300 major ports in this country, we would like to expand upon the existing 250 FTZs,” he said. “But it’s not just about numbers. The FTZs that function at interior locations need to be more efficient, too.”
Part of achieving that goal, said Griswold, will be to work with Congress to get tariffs reduced or eliminated. He explained that one of the disadvantages of the NAFTA (North America Free Trade Agreement) is that shippers are often penalized for doing cross-border trade.

“With the expansion of the Panama Canal, the supply chains are going to become far more complex,” he said. “We at NAFTZ want to help shippers prepare for that.”

Griswold joined Cato’s trade policy program as associate director in 1997 and was named its director in 2004.  The center was formally dedicated to the late Herbert A. Stiefel in 2011.

Griswold has authored numerous studies on such topics as bilateral and regional trade agreements, China trade, the WTO, the trade deficit, antidumping, foreign investment and the cost of protectionism. He has frequently testified before House and Senate committees on subjects including the trade deficit, small business exporting and trade and manufacturing.