Russ Feingold: “as the Senate considers the African Growth and Opportunity Act, we have to keep asking ourselves the key question…”

“as the Senate considers the African Growth and Opportunity Act, we have to keep asking ourselves the key question: Growth and opportunity for whom? It is an important question because the Africa trade legislation we are now considering does not require that Africans themselves be employed at the firms that are going to receive the trade benefits. In fact, AGOA, as it now stands, actually takes a step backwards for Africa. The GSP program requires that 35 percent of a product's value added come from Africa, but this legislation actually lowers the bar to 20 percent. Under this scheme, it is possible that a product would meet the 20-percent requirement and qualify for AGOA benefits. For example, if non-African workers physically standing in West Africa simply sewed a 'Made in Togo' label on apparel and then shipped it to the United States, that is all they would have to do. It makes something of a mockery of how this is supposed to help African countries and African workers. This plan undercuts the potential for trade to boost African employment and encourages transshipment of goods from third countries seeking to evade quotas. As I said before on the other amendment, the U.S. Customs Service has determined that for every $1 billion of illegally transshipped products that enter the United States, 40,000 jobs in the textile and apparel sector are lost.”