BELFAST – The United States and United Kingdom (UK) jointly convened the 8th U.S.-UK Small and Medium-Sized (SME) Dialogue today, bringing together small business representatives from both sides of the Atlantic to identify ways to expand bilateral trade and investment and to enhance broad and inclusive SME participation in our trading relationship. The SME Dialogue is organized by the Office of the United States Trade Representative, the Department of Commerce, and the Small Business Administration alongside the UK Department for Business and Trade.
Bryant Trick, Assistant United States Trade Representative for Europe and the Middle East and Graham Floater, Director for U.S. Trade at the UK Department for Business and Trade opened the SME Dialogue with a fireside chat on U.S.-UK trade priorities and the importance of small businesses in our economies. They were joined by Daniel Krupnick, Associate Administrator for International Trade, Small Business Administration and Cathy Bradin, Head of the Northern Ireland team at the UK Department of Business and Trade, with Tina MacKenzie, Policy and Advocacy Chair of the UK Federation of Small Businesses. Special Envoy to Northern Ireland for Economic Affairs, Joe Kennedy III, provided closing remarks at the SME Dialogue.
Participants at the SME Dialogue discussed opportunities and obstacles to SME trade, including resources available to support their growth in trade between our countries. The discussions focused on the creative industries, digitalization and paperless trading, and intellectual property protection. At the SME Dialogue the U.S. and UK also jointly highlighted their intellectual property (IP) toolkits to help support small businesses.
Established in 2018 in Washington, D.C. and London, and convening subsequently in New York, Bristol, Boston, Edinburgh, and Indio, the SME Dialogue is an ongoing exchange bringing small and medium businesses and stakeholders on both sides of the Atlantic together with government officials to identify ways to deepen U.S.-UK trade and investment ties and strengthen cooperation on issues of mutual interest to SMEs. Trade between the two countries is about $296 billion per year, and together there is around $1.7 trillion invested in each other’s economies. Ninety-two percent of U.S. exporters to the UK are small and medium-sized firms, with over 36,000 small businesses across the 50 states exporting $28.2 billion in goods to the United Kingdom.
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