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AEROSPACE TRADE SURPLUS DROPS TO $26.7 BILLION April 17, 2001-WASHINGTON, D.C. The Aerospace Industries Association reports that record imports and lower exports combined in 2000 to reduce the aerospace trade balance to $26.7 billion, down $14.3 billion--or 34.7 percent--from the 1998 record high of $41 billion. Exports last year dropped $7.8 billion from the previous year to a total of $55 billion. Imports rose $2.9 billion to $28 billion, a record high. Exports of civil transports accounted for the majority of the drop--$6 billion--and imports of civil transports increased by $2 billion. AIA President and CEO John W. Douglass said that the decline in exports could be attributed in part to the cyclical nature of civil transport manufacturing. But he added that a rise in sales of foreign built aircraft to U.S. air carriers accounted for the growth in imports. AIA sent a letter April 11 to President George W. Bush saying that his proposal to cut the U.S. Export-Import Bank’s budget in FY 2002 by 25 percent was particularly ill-timed in light of the current trend in exports and will further erode U.S. aerospace exports. The Ex-Im Bank, Douglass said, "is the only facility available to counter the liberally funded foreign export credit agencies used by competitors of the U.S. aerospace industry." With imports rising and exports falling, he wrote, "it hardly seems appropriate to reduce the bank’s appropriations at this time." Douglass said that government policy regarding exports should first be studied by the President’s Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry. "Before the budget for the Ex-Im bank is cut, the government should be aware that this will adversely affect billions in foreign aerospace sales," he said. Since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. aerospace industry has grown by exporting U.S. aerospace products into the global economy. These recent statistics reflect the need for a more focused national plan for the future of the American aerospace industry, he added. -AIA- Contact: Matt Grimison, AIA P.A. Rel. 2001-16 04.17.01 |
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