China Textile Agreement - New York Times

China Textile Agreement - New York TimesChina Textile Agreement

Published: November 19, 2005
To the Editor:

"The History of Trade, Part 2" (editorial, Nov. 12) criticizes the United States-China textile agreement as protectionist.

The United States textile market is open without restriction to exporters from around the world, with the exception of China, Vietnam, Belarus and Ukraine. We imposed safeguards on textiles from China because we believe that free trade must also be fair.

The imposition of safeguards was within our rights under the World Trade Organization.

Chinese textile exporters will see their shipments grow over the next three years, and the quotas will expire at the end of 2008.

The bilateral United States-China textiles agreement affects less than 3 percent of United States imports from China. There are many different ways to characterize a trading relationship that is 97 percent free of quotas, but "failed" is not one of them.

Franklin L. Lavin
Under Secretary for Intl. Trade
Department of Commerce
Washington, Nov. 17, 2005