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Will CAFTA help or hurt America?


I strongly support swift House passage of the U.S./Central America-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR). It is critically important for the U.S. textile and apparel-supply industries and the more than 700,000 workers in Florida and across the country that they employ.

Eleven major textile and apparel trade associations have voted to support the swift enactment and implementation of this agreement. U.S. cotton farmers, yarn spinners, fabric manufacturers, trim suppliers, apparel companies, textile and sewn-product equipment makers and others have come together for one simple reason: Central America represents one of the best markets for U.S. textile companies. Seventy percent of the clothing made in the CAFTA-DR region is made from U.S. yarns and fabrics. In contrast, Asian garments contain less than 1 percent U.S. content.

Without CAFTA-DR, this region loses its competitive advantage to lower-cost Asian suppliers. Miami's airports, seaports, real estate and many other areas will be affected.

Most important, open markets and free trade have the potential to pull millions of our desperately poor neighbors out of poverty while making them buyers of products made in the United States.

U.S. Sens. Bill Nelson and Mel MartÃÂ*nez did the right thing by voting for CAFTA-DR. I hope that the rest of our state's representatives will follow suit.

GEORGE FELDENKREIS, chairman and CEO, Perry Ellis International, Miami

Floridians should be troubled that Sen. Bill Nelson chose to vote in favor of CAFTA. This fatally flawed trade deal will do much more to send American jobs, rather than American-made products, to Central America.

CAFTA also will undermine our nation's security by leaving Central American workers and businesses helpless against predatory Chinese-export competition. The region's economies will be hammered, and political radicalism will surge -- along with immigration to the United States.

Agricultural groups, textile manufacturers, businessmen from many domestic industries and labor unions have mobilized to defeat CAFTA. When election time comes, they won't forget legislators such as Nelson, who chose to stand with the out-sourcers.

KEVIN L. KEARNS, president, U.S. Business & Industry Council, Washington, D.C.

Have we become so numb and obsessed with making money that endangering our already-fragile environment and continuing to abuse workers with unfair labor-wage practices is acceptable?

How is CAFTA even considered fair when the United States will give up more jobs, supervision and regulation than it will gain?

My guess is that it's because large multinational corporations seek to gain millions of dollars from not having to abide by fair-wage standards and environmental-protection laws that are enforced here.

I would rather see Americans keep their fair-wage jobs instead of losing them to the lowest bidder in Central America.

LOREN COLBURN, Fort Lauderdale

Bob Graham and Mack McLarty wisely look beyond the free-trade political demagoguery of the moment to the long-term security of the Western Hemisphere (CAFTA bolsters security, economy, June 30 Other Views).

Nowhere are the promises and risks of free trade more apparent than in my nation, Costa Rica. For half a century, we have produced the largest and most reliable economic environment in Central America.

The prospect of a regional free-trade agreement presents challenges for us all. But passage of CAFTA is a necessary step in our region's evolution.

CAFTA nations do not seek an unfair trade advantage. We already are excellent U.S. trading partners, constituting a $12 billion annual export market for U.S. goods and services that is larger than those of India, Indonesia and Russia combined, and comparable to that of France.

The agreement fosters economic and democratic reforms, government transparency and labor and environmental protections vital to the long-term security of the hemisphere.

CAFTA also can address labor uncertainties, tariffs and duties, quotas and the protection of intellectual property against piracy and counterfeiting, which already exist as largely unaddressed threats to job markets in our countries and the United States.

To turn away from free trade now would reverse five decades of economic, social and political progress in my nation. It would send a terrible message to our politically and economically developing neighbors.