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Cambodia seeks better US deal on garment exports

PHNOM PENH: Cambodia has appealed to the United States to grant more favourable terms to its garment exporters and warned it could tear up an agreement linking its labour standards with exports to the U.S. market.

Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh said the United States had unfairly judged Cambodian labour standards as wanting and for that reason had refused to grant Cambodia a full 14 percent increase in its quotas on some garments.

The United States had instead said it would grant only five percent increases in its quotas.

Garments are Cambodia's biggest export earner, valued last year at $606 million which was a 60 percent increase over 1998.

Cham Prasidh told a meeting of garment manufacturers that Cambodia might have to renegotiate a January 1999 agreement with the United States linking labour standards with garment exports if it felt it was being treated unfairly.

"You certainly know that if at any time we feel we are exploited or deceived, we can reverse our position," Cham Prasidh told the late Friday meeting, citing a letter to the textile negotiator for the U.S. trade representative, Donald Johnson.

"We still have the power to ask them to negotiate again and delete any linkage with labour provisions. Any time we can do that," he told the meeting.

"I sincerely hope I would never be forced to do so," Cham Prasidh said, citing his letter to Johnson. "I continue to believe you can help us.

"The interests of over 100 garment factories in Cambodia are at stake and the jobs of 50,000 Cambodian workers are threatened."

The United States has been Cambodia's biggest garment market by far but U.S. authorities imposed their first quotas in January last year, setting limits on 12 categories of items.

Under the agreement, the United States said those quotas would be raised by up to 14 percent if there was substantial improvement in working conditions in Cambodia's garment factories.

But Cham Prasidh said late last month the United States had sent a "very discouraging" assessment which found only "certain improvements" in labour conditions.

"The assessment that they have given on our labour standards is not fair," he said, blaming pressure from U.S. trade unions and domestic U.S. politics.

Cham Prasidh appealed to Johnson to grant the five percent U.S. quota increase immediately and not link it to the finalisation of a labour monitoring project. He also asked Johnson to consider granting the full 14 percent quota increase later in the year.

But Cham Prasidh also said there were still garment factories that had not done enough to improve labour conditions and were not fully implementing the labour law.

"There are still some factories that continue to abuse the law. They have given an excuse for the Americans to say that they are not yet satisfied." -Reuters