“The American Manufacturing Trade Action Coalition, which has criticized a variety of free-trade deals largely on the basis that they would further damage U.S. textile manufacturing, called the Vietnam agreement “a disaster for U.S. manufacturing and the U.S. textile industry in particular.This agreement provides an open invitation to continue the devastating trend of outsourcing the very jobs that are so critical to our middle class,” Auggie Tantillo, AMTAC’s executive director, said in a news release .Congress must grant Vietnam most favored nation trade status before the agreement could take effect .Vietnam, the group said, was the seventh-largest exporter of textiles and clothing to the United States as of March. In 2005, the Asian country exported $2.9 billion worth of textile and apparel to the United States .There are already textile industry ties between the Triad and Vietnam .Last summer, according to press reports, Vietnam’s largest state-owned textile company, Vinatex, signed a deal with Greensboro-based International Textile Group to operate a plant there under a joint venture . “Source: The Business Journal.
Date:6/1/2006
Source: