No Sweat, UK
Apparel production around the world is headed for a seismic shift when the long-standing quotas of the Multi-Fiber Agreement (MFA) are completely phased out at the end of this year.
While apparel quotas were originally initiated in 1974 primarily to protect the apparel industries of developed countries from rapidly-growing exporters like South Korea and Taiwan, providing quotas for each country had the impact of creating apparel export industries in countries that had not previously been major apparel exporters. For example, Korean and Taiwanese apparel manufacturers began investing in Central America in the late 1980s and early 1990s after they reached their own quotas and were no longer able to increase exports from their home countries. By taking advantage of quotas set aside for Central American countries, Korean and Taiwanese investors played a major role in the rapid expansion of the apparel industry in the region over the last 15 years, with the quotas providing an export platform somewhat protected from an open market.
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