According to the US-Vietnam Trade Council,  the hearing held by the US Department of Commerce (DOC) on Vietnam- sourced apparel imports monitoring scheme will take place on April 24, at 9 am Washington time, or 9 pm Vietnam time.
Within two hours, the representatives from involved organizations and offices such as: DOC, the American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAEA), the National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO), The National Retailing Union, big trade groups and distributors of apparel products will state their opinions on the situation of importing Vietnam’s textile products.

Two Vietnamese representatives invited to attend the hearing and express their views are Commercial Counselor of the Vietnamese Embassy in the US Nguyen Duy Khien, and Director of the Vietnam Trade Promotion Centre in New York Le Xuan Duong.

Each speaker will have five minutes to express his views and five minutes to respond to questions from the regulatory board.

As Mr Le Quoc An, Chairman of the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (Vitas) said, among the opinions issued, the one by the US National Textile Association is potentially the most worrying. It’s the organization who seriously protects the viewpoint that Vietnam’s textile and garment industry may threaten the US textile and garment industry, and that it is necessary to put Vietnam under special supervision in terms of apparel imports.

Mr An, however, insisted that Vietnam’s consensus view at the hearing is to maintain its stand: Vietnam’s apparel exports to the US will not cause any threats to the similar industry in the US, including dumping activities.

The hearing is a part of the figure analyses carried out every six months by the US DOC under the framework of the Vietnam apparel imports monitoring scheme, which became effective right after Vietnam became a WTO member. This is also an activity of the US Government in return for the agreement of two US congressmens to grant PNTR to Vietnam.

According to David Spooner, US Assistant Secretary of Commerce, who is responsible for importing issues, apparel exports to the US in the first two months of the year 2007 were healthy. He has finished his working visit to Vietnam and told that Vietnamese apparel manufacturer as well as the US importers, retailers have complained that orders in the third and fourth quarters would decrease because the US importers and retailers temporarily delayed to place orders to see what the US DOC would do with this monitoring scheme.

According to The US Trade Association in Vietnam, there are some products such as trousers, t-shirts, underwear, swimming costumes and sweaters which were listed as “the most sensitive items” . In 2006, Vietnam exported $3.4bil worth of apparel to the US, accounting for 40% of the US’ total import turnover from Vietnam.