Ed Royce: “I was one of the original authors of this measure, along with Jim McDermott and Charlie Rangel, and I know how much work…”

“I was one of the original authors of this measure, along with Jim McDermott and Charlie Rangel, and I know how much work over the last week has gone into this in terms of the work by Chairman Dave Camp, by Karen Bass, and by others who have worked to get this bill out of the Senate. I wanted to make a few observations on this measure and the impact it has had. I chaired the Africa Subcommittee when we passed the African Growth and Opportunity Act. It was bipartisan. It was historic. Before, Africa policy was just aid policy. With AGOA, we created a trade policy for Africa. With AGOA, we have seen exports and imports double into sub-Saharan Africa. And I have had the opportunity to see this program's benefits, hundreds of thousands of jobs, most held by women, created in the apparel sector, boosting very poor countries in Africa. And AGOA has also strengthened the rule of law in Africa because that's one of the conditions, that when we wrote this bill and marked it up, we put that conditionality on, that eligibility criteria. And I just wanted to remind the Members for a minute, and this is testimony from Jas Bedi, chairman of the African Cotton and Textile Industry Federation, the eligibility criteria of AGOA compelled most African countries to embrace the rule of law, to allow for political pluralism, and respect democracy and basic human rights. Those were requirements.…”