{"id":13112,"date":"2012-08-03T01:56:28","date_gmt":"2012-08-02T23:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/08\/update-3-us-congress-approves-lifeline-for-african-clothing-workers\/"},"modified":"2012-08-03T01:56:28","modified_gmt":"2012-08-02T23:56:28","slug":"update-3-us-congress-approves-lifeline-for-african-clothing-workers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-3-us-congress-approves-lifeline-for-african-clothing-workers\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 3-US Congress approves lifeline for African clothing workers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Bill extends third-country fabric provision three years<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Secretary of State Clinton on seven-nation African tour<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Doug Palmer<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON, Aug 2 (Reuters) &#8211; The U.S. Congress voted on<br \/>\nThursday to renew a trade measure supporting hundreds of<br \/>\nthousands of jobs in Africa&#8217;s clothing sector, just two months<br \/>\nbefore the measure expires.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Both the Senate and the House of Representatives approved<br \/>\nthe legislation on a voice vote, sending it to President Barack<br \/>\nObama to sign into law.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, who heard pleas for<br \/>\naction on the bill last month at a clothing factory in Ghana<br \/>\nthat makes medical scrubs for Wal-Mart, said Obama was<br \/>\nready to sign it &#8220;as soon as it reaches his desk.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The African apparel industry, which has been hammered in<br \/>\nthe last few months with uncertainty about extension of the<br \/>\n(trade) provisions, can breathe a sigh of relief,&#8221; said<br \/>\nRepresentative Charles Rangel, a Democrat.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), first passed<br \/>\nby Congress in 2000, allows eligible countries in sub-Saharan<br \/>\nAfrica to ship thousands of goods to the United States without<br \/>\npaying import duties.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>A provision that expires Sept. 30 waives duties on clothing<br \/>\nfrom most AGOA countries, even if the yarn or fabric is made in<br \/>\na &#8220;third country&#8221; such as China, South Korea or Vietnam.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Bill extends third-country fabric provision three years * Secretary of State Clinton on seven-nation African tour By Doug Palmer WASHINGTON, Aug 2 (Reuters) &#8211; The U.S. Congress voted on Thursday to renew a trade measure supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs in Africa&#8217;s clothing sector, just two months before the measure expires. Both the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-13112","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13112\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}