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$1.2-trn infrastructure bill signed into law in US, AAFA welcomes move

16 Nov '21
2 min read
Joe Biden. Pic: White House
Joe Biden. Pic: White House

President Joe Biden has signed the $1.2-trillion infrastructure bill into law yesterday. The American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAFA) president and chief executive officer Steve Lamar has emphasised the critical need for comprehensive improvement to the nation's infrastructure following the signing of the US administration's infrastructure package.

The package was a major election campaign promise to revitalise the nation's roads, bridges, waterways and public transport.

Formally called the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the law includes $550 billion in fresh spending on physical infrastructure. The measure provides $110 billion for roads, bridges and major projects, $39 billion for public transit and $66 billion for railways. It also provides $65 billion to expand broadband infrastructure and $55 billion for clear water investments. 

"The shipping crisis has shown that our transportation infrastructure is overloaded and under-developed," said Lamar. "As a nation, we need to make critical investments to our ports, roads, rail, and bridges today, so we can avoid a repeat of this in the future,” he was quoted as saying in an AAFA press release.

"In addition to preventing future crises, we must do more to fix today's shipping crisis. It is critical that all stakeholders come to the table to discuss and resolve the inefficiencies that exist in our current system and develop creative solutions to these problems, including long-term investments and better enforcement of the laws that are currently on the books,” he said.

"We are pleased to see that this legislation enacts the 'Make PPE in America Act,'….to provide strong demand signals and well-crafted procurement requirements to establish long-term opportunities for US domestic PPE production," he added.

The legislation includes the AAFA-supported, and long sought, pilot programme to enable 18-20 year-olds to join the trucker workforce under the DRIVE Safe Act. This provision will help the United States begin to safely address the critical shortage of truckers. The American Trucking Associations reported that currently there is a record shortage of 80,000 truck drivers in the United States.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)

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