¡¡WASHINGTON, May 31 (Xinhuanet) -- US President George W. Bush called on Congress Tuesday to pass an energy bill and ratify the Central American and Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement(CAFTA).

    "We've gone more than a decade without an energy strategy, and as a result, we have grown more dependent on foreign sources of energy, and consumers see the consequences of that at the gas pumpon a daily basis," Bush said in a Rose Garden news conference,

    For the past four years, Bush said, he has urged Congress to pass legislation that encourages energy conservation, that promotes domestic production in environmentally friendly ways, that helps diversify away from foreign oil, that modernizes the electricity grid.

    What he expects is Congress to send him a bill before the August recess, he said.

    As for the CAFTA, Bush said that the agreement is a good deal for American workers and farmers and small businesses.

    About 80 percent of the products from Central America and the Dominican Republic now enter the United States duty-free, but US exports to the countries face hefty tariffs, according to the president.

    "The CAFTA agreement will open a market of 44 million consumersto our producers, to our workers, the products that our workers make, to our farmers,"he said. It "will level the playing field bymaking about 80 percent of American exports to those countries duty-free."

    Meanwhile, Bush said that the US economy is strong because "we've added over 3.5 million new jobs over the last two years, and the unemployment rate is 5.2 percent." Enditem