American textile and apparel companies have not shed jobs because of NAFTA, but rather because they failed to take advantage of the trade pact with Mexico and Canada, a senior U.S. trade official said yesterday.
Bush administration officials staunchly defended the North American Free Trade Agreement during a Senate hearing called more than a decade after NAFTA implementation began.
U.S. fabric and clothing manufacturers have been under intense pressure the past decade, with several firms declaring bankruptcy and others scaling back production as foreign producers grab global market share. Through the past 3 years, the U.S. textile and apparel sectors have contracted by more than 320,000 jobs, nearly a third of its work force, according to industry figures.
The job numbers have less to do with NAFTA than “the failure to take full advantage of what NAFTA had to offer. Many in the U.S. textile industry viewed NAFTA as a means of survival, rather than envisioning the agreement as a vehicle for growth,” said Grant Aldonas, commerce undersecretary for international trade.
Taken more broadly, the manufacturing sector has benefited from NAFTA, which has allowed greater economic growth and productivity in North America, he said. Mr. Aldonas cited specific examples in auto, chemical, environmental technology, communication technology, medical equipment, pharmaceutical production and other sectors.
Workers need to be prepared for a constant string of adjustments as part of a fast-changing economy, he said.
“We will not address the challenges we face in making American manufacturing globally competitive if we take refuge in comforting arguments that lay blame for economic adjustment at the door of particular trade agreements like NAFTA,” he said.
The view of the pact is not unanimous. Organized labor and environmental groups have been especially critical of NAFTA, blaming the pact for job losses and environmental damage.
“The U.S. lost 3 million manufacturing jobs — 1 in 6 jobs in that sector — during NAFTA, and some 525,000 U.S. workers have been specifically certified as NAFTA job-loss victims under just one narrow government retraining program,” the consumer group Public Citizen said in a report looking at 10 years of the trade pact.
Public Citizen also has attacked some NAFTA provisions in court.
And the Supreme Court today is set to delve into the recesses of environmental law and presidential prerogative in a case that will determine whether Mexican trucks can soon begin hauling goods throughout the United States.
NAFTA called for U.S., Canadian and Mexican trucks to be allowed to ply each other’s highways in different stages through the 1990s, but a combination of union pressure, safety concerns and political considerations have kept Mexican trucks out of all but a narrow band of American territory along the U.S. border.
President Bush in November 2002 moved to lift the ban but was blocked when Public Citizen, the Teamsters and other groups filed a lawsuit stating that the move violated U.S. environmental laws.
“The case blends trade agreements, congressional legislation, presidential powers, agency rulemaking and environmental laws into one complicated legal situation,” Marisa Martin, a staff attorney at the Wyoming Outdoor Council, said in a case preview for the American Bar Association.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.