Tomorrow, March 10, marks the first anniversary of the vote in Congress that brought the U.S.-Mexico cross-border trucking pilot project to an abrupt halt. In response to Congress’s action a year ago, Mexico imposed tariffs on 90 U.S. manufactured and agricultural products, largely shutting out $2.4 billion in U.S. exports. Mexico is the second largest U.S. export market partner by far, and the price paid by U.S. workers, farmers and ranchers has already been too high.

Tens of thousands of American jobs are being put at risk by America’s failure to meet its commitment under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to permit cross-border trucking. Last September, a Chamber study found the U.S. failure to implement NAFTA’s cross-border trucking provisions has resulted in $2.2 billion in higher costs for U.S. families and companies, $2.6 billion in lost U.S. exports, and more than 25,000 lost jobs for American workers. Just weeks ago, the business community cheered President Obama when he set the goal in his State of the Union address to double U.S. exports. We’d love to double U.S. exports, not cut them in half — but that’s exactly what’s happening to some U.S. exports to Mexico.

For the sake of American workers and farmers, we can’t allow a pattern to emerge in which Washington’s inaction on trade puts jobs at risk -- whether it’s in the case of cross-border trucking with Mexico, or the looming Brazilian retaliation in the WTO cotton case, or the failure to approve pending FTAs while our trade competitors move ahead.

We are cheered by several developments. First, the congressional action I mentioned expired late last year. In addition, on March 1, a bipartisan group of 56 House members of sent a letter to Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood and U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk noting the “devastating impact on our local industries and area economies.” It said that, despite promises to find a way forward, members of Congress have seen none of the “principles of parameters of a proposed plan” to end the dispute. The business community agrees with these members of Congress that the current situation is unsustainable. Finally, Secretary LaHood said on March 4 that “We’re very near a proposal that we think will meet all the safety concerns.”

All of this talk is great, but we can’t wait, and wait, and wait. On trade, when we stand still, we fall behind.