Chinese Vice-Premier Wu Yi is in Washington DC co-chairing the 17th meeting of the Sino-US Joint Committee on Commerce and Trade with US Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and Trade Representative Rob Portman.

The bargaining process may be difficult for officials of both countries on such touchy issues as trade imbalance, market access and intellectual property rights.

Expectations are high that the meeting might produce a joint declaration promoting US exports to China, and a framework agreement on IPR protection.

Those, along with the multibillion-dollar deals Vice-Premier Wu's 200-strong team has inked on their way to Washington DC, would be practical moves to narrow the trade imbalance, and to defuse the ticking timebomb of protectionism irrationalities.

The real imperative in our trade relations, however, is a dose of reason.

That is exactly what the ongoing session of the joint committee should try to deliver.

Besides immediate remedies for the rising tensions, trade negotiators should avail themselves of the precious opportunity of face-to-face communication to share each other's concerns and perspectives, and clear the way for the healthy progress of bilateral trade.

A worrisome new dimension of Sino-US trade ties has been their increasing vulnerability to politicization. The posturing of ill-informed US politicians on Capitol Hill is not only misleading to the American public, but also threatens to lead bilateral trade talks astray.

There has been enough finger-pointing in our dialogue over trade; a significant, if not the most important, aspect of our relationship. The exchange of blame does little more than reinforce political prejudices and blind us further to the true hurdles that set us apart.

Politicians may lack access to, or the will to find out, the truth about Sino-US trade and our trade officials who monitor and manage our two-way commercial transactions should not surrender to politicizing.

Instead, they need to demonstrate a capacity to rise above the ignorance and biases in dealing with our trade disputes. After all, they are in a privileged position to foresee the lose-lose scenario if the world's two largest foreign traders are at loggerheads.

For that reason alone, the joint committee should at least try to create and maintain an atmosphere conducive to sensible discourse.

(China Daily April 12, 2006)