Governor files categories to protect Saipan garment industry production

Officials of the U.S. Department of the Interior have contacted the Governor’s Office for a list of all categories of production currently being manufactured in Saipan garment factories.

The list will be used in ongoing talks between the Bush administration and China in negotiating a comprehensive trade agreement to lessen the impact of China’s production surge in the U.S. domestic apparel marketplace since the lifting of quota restrictions in 2005.

In a statement from the press secretary’s office, it said that Gov. Juan N. Babauta felt that this overture by the U.S. Interior Department, in forwarding Saipan production categories to U.S. Special Negotiator for Textile Negotiations with China, David Spooner, “indicates the Bush administration’s recognition of Saipan’s difficulties competing globally and the need to protect the CNMI economy.”

“With back-to-back economic hits—the World Trade Organization’s lifting of quota restrictions on China and the decision by Japan Airlines to cease flights to Saipan in October—this request by Interior is welcome, and indeed appreciated,” it quoted the governor as saying.

The Bush administration is eyeing an Aug. 31 deadline for negotiating a trade deal with China to voluntarily limit its production capacity into the U.S. domestic market. The U.S. Committee for Implementation of Textile Agreements, or CITA, can impose annually renewable safeguard measures limiting China’s growth to 7.5 percent per year, but wants to get China to voluntarily agree to lessen its impact on mainland production, as a less troublesome avenue to save American jobs.

“Whatever the [United States] does in restricting China’s exports to American retailers shifts some orders back to our Saipan factories. This can help keep orders flowing into Saipan sewing lines, while we work back in Washington to get a more advantageous tariff formula to enable our firms here to offer better selling prices,” said Babauta.

The Governor’s special assistant for trade relations, Richard A. Pierce, compiled all categories from Saipan garment factories to forward to the U.S. Interior Department.

The Office of the Governor submitted 13 individual categories of production for protective support for Saipan’s 18 knit fabric and three woven fabric factories.