The EU clothing market in 2008 – opening the floodgates?

作者：Louise Curran · 发表于：Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management · 年份：2009 · DOI：10.1108/13612020910974456 · 被引用次数：10 · 研究领域：Global trade, sustainability, and social impact、Global trade and economics、Fashion and Cultural Textiles

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to briefly review the trends on clothing imports into the EU in 2008, the year when quantitative restrictions on all EU clothing imports lapsed. Design/methodology/approach The paper looks at trade figures as reported by Eurostat and, in particular changes between 2004‐2008, the period during which clothing trade was liberalised. Findings The paper finds that clothing imports from China increased in 2008 as predicted by many actors. However the extent of this increase was less than might have been expected from the impact of earlier liberalisations. Several explanations are suggested for this observation. More broadly, the liberalisation of the EU clothing market seems to have had rather negative impacts on clothing suppliers in the EU neighbourhood, while amongst developing country suppliers the impacts have been rather varied, with Bangladesh and India showing quite strong performance while other, often smaller, suppliers have seen rather negative trends. The impact on the Asian tigers has been universally negative, with large falls in exports, especially in Hong Kong and Macao. Practical implications The year 2008 was the first for decades that EU clothing imports were unrestricted by quotas. These trade figures therefore give us a good indication of the true situation in relation to competitive advantage within a sector in which trade has long been distorted by policy. Originality/value The trade figures for 2008 have only just become ...