Catalog

	Table of Contents
p. 22 of 77 BACK | NEXT Foreword, Acknowledgments, Contents, Acronyms and Abbreviations, Definitions I. Developing Asia and the World Developing Asia and the Pacific: Performance and Prospects Prospects for the World Economy in 2006-2007 Subregional Summaries Textiles and Clothing in the Post-Quota Era: The Outlook for Asian Suppliers Introduction: An end to quotas? Historical perspective on textiles and clothing in Asian development Recent performance under the ATC and in the (almost) post-quota era Impact of new US restrictions on the PRC's shipments of textiles and clothing Agenda for future trade reform Endnotes and references The Doha Development Agenda: Asian Challenges and Prospects after the Ministerial Meeting in Hong Kong, China II. Economic trends and prospects in developing Asia III. Routes for Asia's Trade Statistical appendix

Asian Development Outlook 2006 : I. Developing Asia and the World : Textiles and Clothing in the Post-Quota Era: The Outlook for Asian Suppliers

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Agenda for future trade reform

Competitive Asian suppliers of intermediate textile products and clothing have to continue unilateral reform efforts in reducing "behind the border" trade barriers and trade frictions in order to compete successfully in large markets that are offering competitors from outside Asia preferential tariff access. They also have scope to better integrate the value chain in the region through efforts to reduce border barriers to trade in intermediate textile products and clothing accessories. High most-favored nation tariffs on imports remain in many of the larger countries in textiles and clothing tariff lines, particularly those in South Asia and Southeast Asia, as well as the PRC. Asian policy makers could help this process by making these tariffs lower and more uniform (and setting bound tariff rates closer to applied rates).

This rationalization of the tariff structure for textiles and clothing would stimulate intraregional trade and efficient vertical specialization, as has already happened in electronics and office machinery, and it could be safely done on a nondiscriminatory basis. Protection could be retained on less important textile made-up products. The tariff reforms could be carried out on a concerted unilateral basis (e.g., voluntarily) and this would assist development of the intermediate textiles and clothing value chain. Asian suppliers should also seek to improve the terms of their market access to EU, Japan, and US by supporting the Doha Round, which offers the potential to lower peak tariffs in the industrial countries on a most-favored nation basis. The "Swiss formula" adopted at the Ministerial Meeting of WTO in Hong Kong, China in December 2005 under the nonagricultural market access negotiation is designed to accomplish this outcome (see The Doha Development Agenda in Part 1). In addition, acting to negotiate improved discipline over antidumping and other contingent forms of protection, such as safeguard measures under the Trade Rules component of the Doha Round, would help preempt the use of these instruments to take away hard-won gains in Asian suppliers' market shares in world markets for textiles and clothing.

Rules of origin are used to determine which products will or will not receive preferential treatment under the many new bilateral trade agreements that Asian countries are negotiating. Negotiators should strive to adopt simple and consistent rules of origin in order to avoid undermining the development of efficient production-sharing networks. This will be crucial to maintaining the long-run competitiveness of Asian suppliers in the world market for textiles and clothing. As incomes rise and consumption-driven growth prospects increase within developing Asia, simple and consistent rules of origin will facilitate growth in this lucrative segment of intraregional trade.

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