The Made in America promotion effort gained additional ground this week as this year’s High Point opens with a 16,000-square-foot pavilion dedicated to furniture and products made in America.

This is just the latest in news we’ve been reporting on companies, and consumers, bearing down against the rising tide of imported products. In just the past few months:

• Stanley Furniture consolidated its entire manufacture of juvenile furniture back to the United States.

• Seattle-based Taphandles, which makes wood beer tap handles for breweries and tavern operators, is opening a 41,000 square foot plant in Woodinville, WA, as it expands further into wood retail display cases, signage and blackboards. Citing rising Chinese labor costs, the company chose to manufacture the new line domestically rather than enlarging an existing 450-employee plant in China.

Likewise, we’re also seeing a number of Chinese-based companies setting up shop in the states, notably Schnadig, which is owned by Markor, teamed up with Key City to manufacture Schnadig’s high-end Ralph Lauren line and Caracole brand. Craftmaster is another company that has established manufacturing operations in the United States.

Furniture, in fact, has been identified as one of seven sectors that could create 2 million to 3 million jobs in the United States in the next five years, according to research by The Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Transportation goods, electrical equipment/appliances, plastics and rubber products, machinery, fabricated metal products and computers/electronics are the other six industries that could see resurgence in the United States, adding $100 billion in output to the economy.

“A surprising amount of work that rushed to China over the past decade could soon start to come back—and the economic impact could be significant,” Harold L. Sirkin, a BCG senior partner and lead author of the analysis said in a statement. “We’re on record predicting a U.S. manufacturing renaissance starting by around 2015.”

It can’t come soon enough. Analyst Jerry Epperson of Mann, Armistead & Epperson, recently reported that imports accounted for 71.3% of U.S. wood furniture shipments in 2010, and 36.6% of upholstered furniture. And this figure will keep growing unless we do something to keep American men and women working in the industry.

On a similar note, I ask again that you voice your support for the Buy American Improvement Act of 2011, which is still in the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. H.R. 2722 would effectively eliminate the loopholes in the existing Buy American laws by tightening the waiver requirements and not allowing federal agencies to segment projects so they no longer meet the minimum dollar amounts applicable under the current rule. The Act also sets the definition of an American-made product as one that contains a minimum of 75% domestic content, vs. 50%, and also would prohibit the government from counting components which are not available domestically, as “American made.”

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