Members Of The American Footwear Association Urge Government To Renew Trade Agreements.

Recently, the United States clothing and shoes The association led 24 clothing and footwear business executives and retailers to Washington Capitol Hill. They met with senators, congressmen, the Senate Finance Committee and the house fundraising committee to lobby the government to finalize major international trade policies and agreements as soon as possible.

Juanita Duggan, chief executive of the American Apparel and Footwear Association, said two-way trade liberalization and market opening are crucial to the American Apparel Industry and the American employees in the industry. The clothing and footwear industry in the United States has provided 4 million jobs, including industry executives, Spin Workers, purchasing managers, retailers, retail related posts and professional technicians. Similarly, the transport industry has benefited a lot from the garment industry, such as 37 thousand logistics jobs and 235 thousand clean jobs. "In 2012, the United States consumed nearly 20 billion garments and more than 2 billion pairs of shoes. Of these, 98% of shoes and 97% of clothing are produced outside the United States. Two way trade liberalization and open market are very important to the clothing and footwear industry in the United States, and also to the lives of 4 million workers. These relevant workers need Congress and administration to put the relevant international trade policies and agreements on the agenda as soon as possible, update the expired and expired trade items, and promote the trade process of the United States.

It is reported that the clothing and footwear enterprises and retailers visiting the Capitol Hill will receive trade priority next year. They hope to update some trade policies as soon as possible or to introduce relevant renewal plans, such as the Nicaragua trade plan, the expired GSP, the upcoming African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) renewal and the global trade promotion agreement.

These trade agreements have an important impact on the import and export of textiles and clothing in the United States. Take the African Growth and opportunity act as an example, since the implementation of the bill, the number of textile and apparel imported from African countries to the US market has increased significantly, and the export volume from Africa to the United States has increased by 500%, from 8 billion 150 million US dollars in 2001 to US $53 billion 800 million in 2011, of which the textile and garment industry occupies nearly 1 billion US dollars. In addition, Africa has attracted great investment from many enterprises from the United States and other countries to build cotton mills and garment factories.