On 19 November, the US Senate ratified the much-delayed Miscellaneous Trade and Technical Corrections Act of 2004 (S. 671; H.R. 1047), which introduces a number of significant changes to US trade laws. The bill had already been approved in the US House of Representatives in October. According to Eddy Martinez, the executive director of the Center for Export and Investment of the Dominican Republic (CEI-RD), the legislation is good news for the DR’s footwear industry. He said that the newly passed act provides additional incentives and improves preferential access for Dominican footwear exporters to the US market. The bill seeks to help US firms compete globally by suspending duties on input materials used in manufacturing that are not produced domestically and eliminates duties on several hundred specialty items.