WASHINGTON — National Council of
Textile Organizations (NCTO) President and CEO Kim Glas issued a statement
today outlining immediate steps President-elect Joe Biden’s administration and a
new Congress can take to bolster the U.S. manufacturing sector. As President-elect Biden has named several
key members of his economic team in recent days, the U.S. textile industry
stands ready to work with this critical team. NCTO is also eager to work with the new
Congress on advancing these bipartisan priorities.
The U.S. textile industry looks forward
to working with President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team and his administration
to provide input on key policies outlined in the campaign to prioritize investing
in American manufacturing and its workforce, onshoring critical supply chains,
and cracking down on the predatory trade practices that have harmed the
manufacturing sector and U.S. jobs. We
agree with the President-elect that we must not revert to status quo trade
policies that have undermined our nation’s resilience and exacerbated income
inequality by impacting the manufacturing sector and promoting a race to the
bottom that have especially hurt the nearly two-thirds of the American
workforce without college degrees.
As domestic manufacturers, the U.S.
textile industry fully supports the President-elect’s campaign pledge to
strengthen ‘Buy American’ rules and invest in government purchases of
American-made products. It is imperative
that we strengthen the domestic personal protective equipment (PPE) supply
chain to achieve a long-term goal of ending our over-reliance on China and begin
onshoring the production of critical medical textiles. We look forward to working with the
President-elect and his team to strengthen and maintain these supply chains,
which is a paramount national and healthcare security issue. Further, we are
prepared to engage with leaders in Congress to enact bipartisan legislation to
ensure we can make the long-term investments needed to fully bring critical PPE
production back to the United States.
The COVID-19 crisis has made clear to
Democrats and Republicans alike that our past trade policies have left the
United States too reliant on imports of essential goods.
Our
national trade and economic agenda must put American manufacturing workers at
the center. President-elect Biden has
committed to taking on China and other countries that utilize predatory trade and
economic tactics that have hurt domestic manufacturers and we welcome that call.
There are four immediate steps the
Biden administration can take in the first months in office to help boost
investment in the U.S. textile industry and onshore critical PPE supply chains.
Expand
Investment in American-Made PPE: We strongly endorse President-elect
Biden’s plan to bolster the industrial base through strong Buy American
proposals. The Berry Amendment, a
domestic procurement law that governs purchases by the Defense Department, has
been an essential tool of national security policy to ensure our warfighters
and military personnel are wearing 100% Made-in-America product and that we are
not relying on foreign supply chains from China and elsewhere to supply
critical military materials. Our
healthcare workers are on the front lines and we need to ensure that the
products they are wearing are made in America and that they meet the critical performance
requirements of the healthcare setting. Regrettably,
our overreliance on China for these essential products failed to meet our needs
during a time of crisis. That can never
happen again; we must onshore and diversify these critical supply chains moving
forward.
Expanding
the Berry Amendment to federal purchases of PPE is a central element of pending
bipartisan legislation known as The
American PPE Supply Chain Integrity Act, which should be adopted. In addition, we urge the federal government to
deploy long-term federal contracts for PPE to spur investment and create jobs
in the U.S., a key element of separate pending bipartisan legislation named the Make
PPE in America Act. Lastly,
we believe we must utilize tax incentives to help promote the domestic
manufacturing industrial base and U.S. manufacturing jobs.
Appoint
a High-Level COVID-19 Coordinating Supply Chain Team: In order to help ensure industry is meeting
federal government needs and priorities, it is critical that the U.S. textile
industry and PPE producers have a high level of communication and coordination with
key officials across all the government agencies procuring medical PPE. Establishing a key point person and team is
critical to ensure the necessary collaboration to help industry and government
respond quickly and effectively to national, state and local PPE needs. A high-level team comprised of experts
committed to U.S. manufacturing is vitally important in advancing both
short-term needs and long-term supply chain efforts. As such, we are prepared to do our part in
developing a streamlined, high-level coordination structure that ensures that
the contracting process yields timely acquisition of quality U.S.-made PPE and
other medical items.
Continue
to Support Tariffs and Strong Trade Enforcement: We also
appreciate President-elect Biden’s pledge to continue aggressive trade
enforcement actions against China, along with his willingness to work long-term
with international coalitions to comprehensively address systemic predatory
trade practices. For far too long, our
industry, like so many others in the manufacturing sector, has been hindered by
predatory trade practices. The U.S.
textile industry is highly automated and is proud to compete with anyone in the
world on a level and fair playing field.
But the rules of the road are not always abided by or fair – and,
regrettably, the U.S. textile industry has far too often faced that sobering
reality. This is why aggressive enforcement
actions, including continuing punitive tariffs on finished products, is
critical to getting the Chinese to address systemic unfair trade advantages,
such as government subsidies, state-owned enterprises, forced labor practices,
weak environmental standards, intellectual property theft and currency
manipulation that non-market economies use to manipulate global markets and
hurt U.S. producers. Punitive tariffs coupled
with other enforcement mechanisms are also necessary to increase negotiating
leverage to address these larger systemic issues. We need to appropriately punish countries
that engage in unfair and illegal practices while rewarding companies that
invest in the United States for critical materials like PPE, and work to further
strengthen our alliances with our existing free trade agreement and trade
preference partner countries.
Provide
Targeted Stimulus to U.S. Manufacturers and Workers: The
unprecedented reduction in consumer demand since the onset of COVID-19 has significantly
hurt the U.S. textile industry and other key manufacturing sectors of the
economy. It is critical that the textile
industry and other impacted manufacturing sectors and their workforce have
access to critical support like the Paycheck Protection Program. Additionally, this program should be expanded
to ensure more medium-sized manufacturers that have made PPE have the opportunity
to participate. A robust manufacturing
stimulus will help stabilize the industry and lead to critical domestic job
growth in this important sector and we urge Congress and the administration to
come together to implement a plan as soon as possible.
We look forward to working with
President-elect Biden and the new Congress and their teams on implementing
these key immediate priorities in the days ahead.
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NCTO
is a Washington, DC-based trade association that represents domestic textile
manufacturers, including artificial and synthetic filament and fiber producers.
- U.S.
employment in the textile supply chain was 585,240 in 2019.
- The
value of shipments for U.S. textiles and apparel was $75.8 billion in 2019.
- U.S.
exports of fiber, textiles and apparel were $29.1 billion in 2019.
- Capital
expenditures for textile and apparel production totaled $2.5 billion in 2018,
the last year for which data is available.
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CONTACT:
Kristi
Ellis
Vice
President, Communications
National
Council of Textile Organizations
kellis@ncto.org |
202.684.3091