"If the US raised an anti-dumping investigation on Vietnam-sourced apparel products, it would cause big damages to Vietnam’s textile and garment industry, and make 1mil workers jobless."

I am disappointed with the pettiness of the US towards a poor country like Vietnam trying to develop itself after all the devastations from the Vietnam war at the hand of the US. How could Vietnam dump their apparel? It's a farce because the labor cost is so low, that's why the products are dirt cheap. The US textile cannot compete and then resort to anti-competitive tactics to shut out Vietnam. Why are they not complaining about textiles from China but only from Vietnam? I don't see the logic. I feel sorry for those Vietnamese who would lose their jobs if this anti-competitiveness continues to exist.


US apparel importers halt placing orders with Vietnam
17:07' 06/06/2007 (GMT+7)

VietNamNet Bridge – According to the Vietnam Textile and Garment Group (Vinatex), US importers have not placed orders for the third quarter of 2007.

US importers will only make decisions in August, when the US Department of Commerce (DOC) makes comments under the framework of the textile and garment imports monitoring programme imposed on Vietnam-sourced apparel products.

Now, US importers who fear that DOC will make comments unfavourable for imports from Vietnam are trying to delay signing contracts. They may exclude Vietnam from the list of apparel suppliers if DOC releases unfavourable judgements in August.

Vietnam’s apparel exports are expected to fetch $7.35bil in 2007, an increase of 27% over 2006. Export turnover witnessed an increase of 24.3% only in the first five months of the year with the average monthly export turnover of $537mil. If the rate maintains for the whole year, the total export turnover for 2007 would reach $6.5bil only, far below the targeted level.

If the current situation cannot be improved, Vietnam will find it very difficult to fulfill the yearly export plan, since the US consumes 55% of Vietnam’s apparel exports. In 2006, the US imported $3.04bil worth of apparel from Vietnam.

After Vietnam joined the WTO, the US removed the quota scheme on Vietnam-sourced imports, but then decided to apply the textile and garment imports monitoring programme. The decision has been worrying US importers and retailers who dare not sign contracts with Vietnamese partners. The monitoring scheme has forced Vietnam to apply measures to control apparel exports itself in an effort to avoid possible anti-dumping lawsuits.

Diep Thanh Kiet, Deputy Chairman of the HCM City Knitting, Embroidery and Textile Association, said that there were many nonsensical points in the monitoring scheme. Among apparel exporters shipping goods to the US, Vietnam just ranks 9th in export quantity and 6th in export value. Meanwhile, only China, the biggest exporter to the US, is facing the safeguard measures from the US, while other exporters bigger than Vietnam, are not being burdened by any monitoring programmes.

Vietnam just accounts for 3% of the US total apparel imports; therefore, it cannot be a threat to the textile and garment industry. The average export unit price of Vietnam-made products in 2006 was $2.96, much higher than the US average import unit price at $1.79, and higher than the prices offered by other countries.

If the US raised an anti-dumping investigation on Vietnam-sourced apparel products, it would cause big damages to Vietnam’s textile and garment industry, and make 1mil workers jobless.

Look at the ambitions to capitalize on our people...

I thought the whole point of the WTO was to remove quotas. But it seems the WTO did was place the monitoring system which results in no orders which is worse than the quota system.

This violates WTO rules and Vietnam should defintely violate some of the treaties it signed like the nuclear arms treaty and put tariffs on U.S goods that enter Vietnam as well and placing restriction on US companies in Vietnam.

If U.S can violate WTO rules with Vietnam, Vietnam should do the same. But I don't think they have the balls to do it.

I guess this proves to Yellow Flag Wavers who always envision the U.S as the "Good guy" that they shouldn't be trusted with signing treaties and it is Vietnam that always follows it.

Like I've always said Vietnam needs to start moving their economy from apparels to something more high tech.

I lose no sleep over this because when you play with the American capitalist pigs, you're bound to get screwed sooner or later. Besides, ba que Americans have been sending home American dollars so I consider those monies compensations . If things don't change, I believe we'll keep milking those cash cows for a long time to come, or until their t!t$ are dry. You gotta love these cash cows. They can keep waving that yellow flag as long as the money continues to flow. The Money Must Flow!

And there we have the true face of communism. They will hold a gun to your family's head unless you give them money. As long as they get their money, no one gets hurt.

BTW. I also can't stand those factory owners in Vietnam, using its poor people for cheap labor. Take a look at the conditions in those factories, no air conditioning, few windows, and no thoughts about fire escape. They could never get away with that in their own countries, but since Vietnam is full of poor peasants. They should be grateful for anything they get.

Those foreign factory owners need to understand that THEY ARE PRIVILEGE TO BE IN VIETNAM. They are guest in the country and should act like it, especially the Taiwanese and South Korean business owners. If they just want labor slaves, then go to China. Vietnam has enough resources to take care of themselves. All they need is knowledge. Knowledge the commies won't allow because it challenges their power.

You just describe the conditions in a US-based, Vietnamese-owned sweatshop my mom and pop used to work in.

They sure could, can, and are.


Just keep sending back all that compensations, cash cow!

Well the US government never honoured the geneva treaty to hold the elections and they aren't honoring the WTO agreements now. I don't think Vietnam should get into bed with these liars.

Vietnamese made BLACKHAWK MILITARY GEARS are selling very well in the US.................They are very well made and very costly $$.

WTO rules or any other kind of "free-trade" rules are nothing if no one wants to play by the rules. Anyone can come up/make up reasons to not import foreign products. Anyone who works at a Vietnamese port know that they can make easy money by coming up with excuses/reasons for not allowing a foreign ship to dock at our port and unload their products to our market. If these foreign ships don't "behave", we can make them wait out at the sea for days,...or even months.lol ......and that is just dealing with docking at our ports.

American like to play "law of the jungle" with Vietnam; that's fine considering the fact that we sell to them something like 10 times more than we buy from them.

WTO doesn't guarantee economic success. Many developing countries are WTO members but are still very poor like Cambodia and some countries in Africa. WTO is designed to help the Western countries to get richer while giving out some bread curmbs to poorer countries. Its purpose is to break down to tariff system which would then allow Western companies to export goods back to their countries with very little tariff. Vietnam has to be a shrewd businessman to play on this non-level playing field designed to enrich wealthy countries. WIthout economic leverage like China, Vietnam will always be at the mercy of the US economic domination.