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The degradation of nuclear and extended families across all classes will produce severe social and economic dislocations with political consequences, as well. Nearly 35 million children in 27 countries will have lost one or both parents to AIDS by 2000; by 2010, this number will increase to 41.6 million. Nineteen of the hardest hit countries are in Sub-Saharan Africa, where HIV/AIDS has been prevalent across all social sectors. With as much as a third of the children under 15 in hardest-hit countries expected to comprise a ``lost orphaned generation'' by 2010 with little hope of educational or employment opportunities, these countries will be at risk of further economic decay, increased crime, and political instability as such young people become radicalized or are exploited by various political groups for their own ends; the pervasive child soldier phenomenon may be one example.
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DESTABILIZING POLITICAL AND SECURITY IMPACT
In our view, the infectious disease burden will add to political instability and slow democratic development in Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Asia, and the former Soviet Union, while also increasing political tensions in and among some developed countries.
The severe social and economic impact of infectious diseases, particularly HIV/AIDS, and the infiltration of these diseases into the ruling political and military elites and middle class of developing countries are likely to intensify the struggle for political power to control scarce state resources. This will hamper the development of a civil society and other underpinnings of democracy and will increase pressure on democratic transitions in regions such as the FSU and Sub-Saharan Africa where the infectious disease burden will add to economic misery and political polarization.
I see another colleague who wishes to speak. I will summarize why I have chosen to read at length from this intelligence report. It is very clear. The threat of these HIV/AIDS problems and other infectious diseases is not something that is separate from or different from the piece of legislation that we are looking at today. This is titled the ``African Growth and Opportunity Act.'' It is supposed to hold out the promise not only of profit for Americans who want to trade with Africa but also genuine hope in the future for the nations of Africa and the people of the African countries.
Without a genuine attempt in this bill to begin to deal, in particular, with the HIV/AIDS problem, as well as other issues, this is a false promise, it is a hollow statement, and, I am afraid, one that could lead to a cynical response from those in Africa who will see this for what it really is: a one-sided piece of legislation that ignores one of the greatest human tragedies in human history and certainly a tragedy that completely undercuts the notion that we can have a good trading relationship with a continent that is being destroyed by such a vicious disease.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah is recognized.
Mr. BENNETT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I might be allowed to proceed as in morning business.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The remarks of Mr. BENNETT pertaining to the introduction of S. 2539 are located in today's RECORD under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I rise today to speak in support of the Conference Report on the Trade and Development Act of 2000. It is important to remind everyone this is the first substantive trade bill we have passed since the Uruguay Round implementation bill in 1994. It is about time. We Americans have, by far, the largest and most dynamic economy in the world. We are the world's only superpower. We better act like one. And that means taking leadership on global trade issues and trade policy, not burying our heads in the sand. Completion of this bill is a first step. Passage of PNTR for China is another.
I would like to make several general comments about this legislation. Then I will highlight some of its major sections and explain why they are in the best interest of the United States.
In two weeks, the House is scheduled to vote on whether to extend permanent Normal Trade Relations status to China. The Senate vote will follow. I am confident that it will pass in both houses. These two pieces of legislation have a common underlying set of principles.
First, a market-based economy, the rule of law, and the reduction and elimination of barriers to foreign trade. These all lead to greater growth, both for our trade partners domestically, as well as and for the global economy.
Second, greater interchange of goods, services, investment, and people between the United States and developing countries. This leads, over the long-run, to domestic stability in those nations, and greater global stability.
Third, if the United States were to turn inward today, we would be turning our back on a global trade and economic system that has brought us to the greatest height of prosperity in the history of the world.
Although the disparities in income around the world are greater than in the past, hundreds of millions of people have been raised out of poverty over the last two decades. We need to do a lot more to ensure that people in America and people overseas are not passed over by this growth. But raising trade barriers, reversing trade liberalization, and halting our efforts to open markets around the world is not the answer. That would only worsen income disparities and increase the number of people living in poverty.
The outcome of our conference is not perfect. It never is. But the result is absolutely in our national interest.
The two major sections of the bill are the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, and the United States-Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act. The Africa portion is but one step in bringing Africa into the global economic system. And in promoting development on this terribly poor continent.
Many of the problems of Africa are home grown. Many of the problems are the vestige of totally inept and irresponsible colonial rule.
We can provide ways, in this case through economic development, industrial growth, and debt relief, for Africa to begin to emerge from its cycle of poverty.
The Caribbean Basin was put at a competitive disadvantage once NAFTA came into effect. This bill brings the CBI nations up to parity with Mexico. At the same time, it requires important commitments from those nations on intellectual property rights, on WTO obligations, on participation in negotiations in the free trade area of America, on fighting the war against corruption, on respecting internationally recognized worker rights, and on protecting against the worst forms of child labor.
Under this bill, a country in Africa or the Caribbean must commit to protect internationally recognized worker rights in order to receive benefits. Congress has debated the issue of the relationship between trade and labor for years. I am very pleased we have acted in support of one of the most basic sets of human rights. I hope this is an indication that we will start making real progress in reconciling trade and labor in future trade legislation.
Let me mention several other provisions of the bill that are of particular import. I deeply regret the provision passed by this Senate to provide trade adjustment assistance for farmers was not included in the conference report. Our farmers have suffered as much as any sector of our economy. Yet they fall between the cracks in our TAA policy, and that was not the intention when trade adjustment assistance was originally conceived.
As a compromise, the Secretary of Labor must submit a report examining the applicability to farmers of trade adjustment assistance programs. Further, the Secretary must make recommendations, either to approve the operation of those programs as they apply to farmers, or to establish a new program for farmers. These provisions are utterly inadequate. I guarantee we will revisit this issue. Farmers suffering adversely from the impact of trade should be provided with the means to adjust, just as factory workers do today.
I strongly support the provision establishing a chief agricultural negotiator at USTR, with the rank of ambassador. Agriculture is at the core of our economy and our society, and our agricultural trade negotiators need this high visibility to represent American interests properly.
I might add that agriculture disparities around the world are the only major remaining trade distortion not yet addressed either in GATT or WTO. It is agriculture trade distortions which are the major remaining significant barrier to trade with which we have not yet dealt.
I am very pleased this effort includes provisions dealing with the ways we deal with products made with forced or indentured child labor. Every time I hear that phrase ``forced or indentured child labor,'' I get chills down my spine. It bothers all of us when we hear that. This conference report also includes provisions to deal with that and it includes new eligibility criteria in the GSP, Generalized System of Preferences, regarding the elimination of the worst forms of child labor.
I wish to recognize my colleague, Senator TOM HARKIN, for his tireless efforts on behalf of the rights of children
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As has Senator HARKIN, I have traveled to some of the most inhospitable places in the world, and I have seen children working and living in conditions that would not be shown in a R-rated movie. I am proud to join him in supporting these measures.
Finally, wool tariffs. For years, there have been efforts to reduce the tariffs on the finest worsted wool. This is a complex issue affecting the manufacturers of wool suits, the manufacturers of wool fabric, the yarn spinning industry, wool growers, and retailers. The conference report provides for the temporary reduction of tariffs on a limited quantity of certain wool fabrics. It temporarily suspends the duty on certain wool yarns, fibers, and tops. And it establishes a $9 million wool research development promotion trust fund. This fund will assist wool producers in improving the quality of wool produced in the United States and help develop and promote the wool market. I welcome this thoughtful compromise that serves all concerned groups.
In sum, I am pleased the House has passed this comprehensive and historic trade package. I strongly support it. I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of it. America is the world leader in promoting a market economy and knocking down trade barriers in order to improve the quality of life, both in our country and abroad. We need to continue this, first, by approving this conference report, and then, shortly, by approving PNTR for China.
I yield the floor.
Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, as the distinguished Majority Leader knows, I have made no secret of my opposition to the conference report to accompany H.R. 434, the so-called African Growth and Opportunity Act. And though there's no doubt that the conference report will be adopted by the Senate, I am obliged to point out that Congress is on the brink of passing legislation that accelerates the loss of a significant part of America's manufacturing base and costs numerous jobs in the beleaguered textile and apparel industry.
Let me say at the outset that I certainly am not against ``African growth'' or ``African opportunity'' or economic growth in the Caribbean Basin. But I do not believe--and will not be convinced--that U.S. trade policy should aid emerging economies at the expense of an entire domestic industry and thousands of American workers.
But make no mistake, Mr. President, that is precisely what is occurring this week in the United States Senate. Consider the evidence: The textile industry is already operating under an enormous trade deficit. For every $6 million in apparel and fabric the industry exports, $21 million is imported, the vast majority of which streams in from third-world countries with cheap production costs. I don't suspect any Senator will seriously argue that H.R. 434 will do anything but dramatically increase this trade deficit.
Why is this so? Because American textile companies simply cannot compete on a playing field that isn't a level playing field. As cheap imports continue to flood the domestic market, job loss will not only continue, but increase. The media report news of our booming economy, but this so-called ``boom'' has left the textile and apparel industry out in the cold. As the Clinton administration crows about low unemployment, the Bureau of Labor Statistics also announced that just last month, 3,000 textile jobs were lost. Since 1994, when Congress passed the North American Free Trade Agreement, this industry alone has lost 453,000 jobs.
That's not just a statistic, Mr. President. That's 453,000 families forced to contend with the stress and displacement that accompany job loss. That's 453,000 workers forced to find new means to make their livelihood, often at lower-paying, entry level jobs for which they have little or no training.
453,000 Americans lost their job Mr. President, 70,000 of whom are North Carolinians. Let's try to put that job loss statistic into perspective. The distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator ROTH, knows that there are only 412,000 jobs in the entire state of Delaware. A senior member of his committee, Senator BAUCUS, who was a conferee on this legislation, surely is aware that there are only 389,000 total jobs in Montana. Alaska has 289,000 jobs, Wyoming has 235,000 jobs, Vermont 296,000, South Dakota 381,000 and North Dakota 325,000 jobs.
Perhaps Senators would feel differently about U.S. trade policy if all of the workers instead of their entire states lost their jobs in the last decade. Yet that's the
precarious state of textile and apparel in America, Mr. President, and Congress continues to promote policies that will further erode the industry.
In the textile communities of North Carolina, where 18 plants shut down in 1999 alone, you can bet they don't talk much about the booming economy. They're talking about something else.
Last April, I held a hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee on the effects of NAFTA five years after it took effect. Among those who provided testimony was a wonderfully unassuming women named Vontella Dabbs. Ms. Dabbs works at Delta Mills in Maiden, North Carolina, and although she was seated at the same table with Ambassador Richard Fischer and Pat Buchanan, she stole the show.
I am going to quote extensively from her testimony because it's important and it bears repeating again and again. She said the following:
I come to you not as an expert in any field, not as a politically motivated person, but simply as an American that is deeply concerned for both my future and the future of my family and friends. I cannot quote you statistics or give you fancy computer-generated data to support some theory about foreign trade. What I can give you are honest and heartfelt feelings about what's going on in our community, as related to the foreign trade agreements and the people who work in textile plants .....
Today ..... modern textile companies and plants are threatened by one thing that I feel can put an end to our entire industry. This threat is that we are not being given a fair opportunity to compete with foreign business on a level playing field. Many of the well-intentioned laws, treaties, and trade agreements enacted during the past few years have made the competition between domestic and foreign textile business unfair, in favor of the foreign producers. These treaties and laws and trade agreements have not really opened up the world to American textiles, as was intended, but instead have opened our borders for foreign manufacturers to flood our country with goods produced with near slave labor in deplorable conditions for workers. These agreements have also created an incentive for American manufacturers to close the door on American manufacturing and go south to Mexico and the Caribbean to invest millions in foreign countries. And by doing this, they are putting thousands of hard-working Americans out of a job.
It's hard to argue with that, Mr. President, though I have no doubt that many of my colleagues will try to do so. I can hear them now, saying that may comparable new jobs have been created through the growth of the retail industry. To which the textile communities of North Carolina say, ``Thanks for nothing.'' Textile jobs pay 63 percent more than retail jobs. While the average mill worker earns wages of $440.59 a week, retail workers make only $270.90.
Worse, the loss of textile jobs means money is drained from the economies of the hardest-hit communities, making it impossible for these towns to support this highly touted new retail employment. When the mills close, workers can't simply consult the local newspapers to get another job. Instead, they are forced to relocate, looking for those elusive retail jobs that pay barely more than half than the job they just lost, and are growing most rapidly in larger cities with a higher cost of living.
With this in mind, the last thing Congress needs to do is increase the amount of cheap imports coming into our markets. Yet this is exactly what H.R. 434 will do. Even worse, however, the bill provides the perfect loophole for Asian countries to circumvent U.S. import restrictions. No wonder many
people around town are starting to refer to this legislation as the ``Chinese Transshipment Bill.''
Here's how Asian companies can easily conduct illegal transshipments from both African and Caribbean nations, Mr. President. Asian companies, which currently must comply with U.S. quota and duty requirements, will simply set up shop in the nations that benefit from this legislation. Once they are in operation, it's impossible to know whether garments are actually
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Mr. President, these illegalities certainly won't benefit American textile companies--and it's hard to see how it does much for the African and Caribbean nations that this bill is ostensibly designed to help. Instead, it merely allows already-established Asian companies to use these nations as simple fronts for their own business. I certainly hope that's not what the Senate has in mind.
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