- The removal of Multi- Fiber Agreement was not a positive thing.
WHY?
- Country such as China will monopolize the industry due to the comparative advantage, low wage, and productive work force, economies of scale, good infrastructure, reliable delivery and commitments as compared to other countries like Bangladesh. (Although countries like India and Bangladesh can offer low wage)
- With the expiration of MFA (elimination of trade quotas), it brings countries to a more open trade economy; reduce trade barriers. However, it results in trade distortion practices in some dominant countries, hurting domestic producers. The allowance for expiration of MFA was to liberalize trade for nations but it seems likewise. Instead, it created a domination of world trade in textile by countries which are able to trade at lower cost, which was detrimental to the domestic trade industry of more developed country.
- Moreover, such monopolization inevitably damage the well being of the developing nations (e.g. India, Bangladesh, Vietnam etc.) whereby the textile sector is the basic unit of the export market growth.
- Statistically, Bangladesh textile market grew by 0.5 billion dollars (majority from the sales in US) and countries such as Vietnam, India and Pakistan expects a rise in textile market. This was the result of a lower wage cost and the belief of diversification of textile supply to hedge against disruption in China. However, in the long run, China’s comparative advantage of manufacturing textiles out run the rest of the developing nations; results in monopolization once again.
- If such situation happens, there might be evidence of textile market failure in the less comparative developing nations.
- In monetary context, a fast rise in demand for China’s textile leads to a rapid appreciation in RMB. However, with the fact that China is in a heavily managed