[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (2000, Book I)]
[May 12, 2000]
[Pages 918-920]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
Opening Remarks at a Roundtable Discussion in Akron on Permanent Normal
Trade Relations With China
May 12, 2000
Thank you. First of all, I'd like to thank Congressman
Sawyer for inviting me here today, and I thank
all of you for joining us. I know we have people here who have a lot of
different views on this China issue, but I think that's important. I
think this is a big part of what
[[Page 919]]
makes our democracy work is that we sit and try to talk through these
things.
I've got a few notes here that are specific to Ohio, so I'd like to
just go over them. Obviously, I've spent a lot of time on this trade
agreement with China, which was negotiated in order to let them in the
World Trade Organization. And in order for us to benefit from its
provisions, we have to grant them normal trading status on a permanent
basis. For the last 20 years, ever since the formal opening of China in
1979, we've been doing it on an annual basis. So this--I want to make
sure we understand, the decision before Congress is whether to go from
an annual review of their trade relationships with us, to give them
permanent normal trading status--that is, the same status that virtually
every other country in the world enjoys.
Now, it's important to recognize that whatever you think the long-
term consequences are, the short-term consequences are all running in
our favor, because today we have a very large trade deficit with China,
and they have very large tariffs and other barriers to our doing
business with them. What this does is, they take down a lot of their
barriers to trade and investment with America in return for membership
in the World Trade Organization, which puts them in the global trading
system and requires them to follow certain rules and gives us some way
to appeal if they don't follow those rules. But what they get is
membership in the club. What they give us are membership dues. That's
the way you have to look at this. And the access, on purely economic
terms, is, I think, quite impressive.
Today, Ohio is the leading State in machinery exports. Two-thirds of
the industrial workers in this State have jobs that benefit in whole or
part from exports. In the last 5 years--or from '93 to '98--Akron's
exports to China have more than doubled. Over the same period, Ohio's
exports to China also more than doubled. And this involves almost every
sector of the Ohio economy. It's over $350 million now.
So if this passes--Secretary Glickman can
talk about it later as well--there will be huge new markets for
agriculture, new markets for automobiles, new markets for high-tech
equipment, new markets for telecommunications equipment. We will be able
for the first time, for example, to sell cars there or sell auto parts
there without either having to put a manufacturing plant in China or
transfer manufacturing technology. That's never been possible before.
And the tariffs will drop on average in some of these areas, say, from
25 percent to 10 percent over a period of just a few years. So it's a
big--it's in every way an economic winner.
In addition to that, you should know that last April, a year ago, we
had most of this, but not all this agreement. And I consulted with,
among others, the AFL-CIO and other people who were concerned about
whether the economics work out fairly, and they asked me to go back and
get some new provisions about our trade relations, so that if China
dumped a lot of products into our market in a certain area, which
threatened a lot of jobs, we could take immediate and quick action. I
did that; that's why we didn't get this agreement last April.
I went back--China has now agreed to give us the right, for more
than a decade, to move against them on a bilateral basis if there's
trade injury in America. And the standard of proof we have to make is
lower than the standard of proof we have to make under our laws for
every other country in the world. And they agreed to this. They agreed
to allow us to bring action against them if there's severe dislocation
of our markets under a standard of proof lower than we have for any
other country in the world, which is what I was asked to do, and we got
that, against surges of imports and dumping and things like that.
So I think it is a good deal economically. But I have to tell you, I
think it's more important for our national security. Why? Because if we
let China in the WTO, they will be inside the world trading system. They
will have a strong interest in working with other people and cooperating
with other people. They will have a strong disincentive not to have
trouble with Taiwan, even though there's a lot of tension between the
two of them, as all of you have heard. And I think we'll be able to
continue to work with them and relate to them and make progress on a
whole range of other fronts.
I think it's quite interesting that most, not all, but most of the
human rights activists in China, most of the democracy activists in
China are for this agreement. There was a big article on the cover of
one of our--I think the Washington Post, yesterday on the front page,
where they'd gone and actually interviewed dissidents in China who were
severely alienated from the Government, and everybody they interviewed
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said, ``Please do this. If you don't do this, America won't have any
influence over the Chinese. You'll never be able to help us. We'll never
be able to move forward. We'll be isolated; we'll be more repressed.''
Martin Lee, the long-time democracy advocate
in Hong Kong--who can't even go to China, has never met the Premier of
China, for example, Zhu Rongji--in America last
week said, ``You have to do this. If you don't vote for this, you have
no influence. You can't help me. Nothing will happen. And the chances of
something bad happening in China will be much greater.'' The President-
elect of Taiwan, who has previously advocated
independence from China, wants us to vote for this.
Now, there are people in China who don't want this to pass. The most
militant elements in the military, the most traditional elements, the
people who control the state-owned industries, they don't want this to
pass because they know if they open up China, their control will be
undermined. And in one of the great ironies of this whole trade debate,
I've never--it's an unusual thing to see that some of the most
progressive people in our country are taking a position that is
supported by only the most regressive people in their country. Because
they know that isolation helps them to maintain control and the status
quo.
I honestly believe this is by far the most important national
security vote we will take this year. I think if we pass it, it will
strengthen and stabilize our position in Asia and reduce the likelihood
of conflict, even war, there for a decade. I think if we don't pass it,
it will increase the chances that something bad will happen.
That's not a threat, and goodness knows if I didn't prevail, I would
pray that I was wrong. I can only tell you that I've been doing this a
long time. I believe I know what I'm talking about, and I think that
it's very, very important.
And so, for whatever it's worth, that's why we're here. And
Tom was good enough to get this panel together so
we could just have a conversation. That's what this is about, and I want
to hear from you. And I'm sure after this is over, all our friends in
the media will want to hear what you said to me. [Laughter] And you feel
free to tell them. But I think we ought to start now and have that
conversation.
Thank you.
Note: The President spoke at 11 a.m. in a classroom at the Ohio Army/
National Guard Facility. In his remarks, he referred to Hong Kong
Democratic Party Chair Martin Lee; and President-elect Chen Shui-bian of
Taiwan.