World Trade in Clothing and Textiles

In 1986 clothing and textiles represented about 9 per cent of world merchandise trade and they grew at 5 per cent a year (GATT 1987d). Clothing and textiles had approximately equal shares of about 4.5 per cent each in this total, with values of $61 billion and $66 billion respectively.

World trade in clothing and textiles has been dominated by the industrial countries. In textiles, industrial countries are both major importers and exporters, with a share of 65 per cent in the world market in 1986. Half of the world textile trade takes the form of intra-industrial countries' trade. Industrial countries account for 85 per cent of the world clothing trade; 41 per cent is intra-industrial country trade.

The EC is the world's largest importer and exporter of clothing and textiles. It accounts for 42 per cent of world textile imports and 40 per cent of clothing imports. However, most of these imports take the form of intra-EC trade (Table 4.1). The United States is the second largest importer of clothing with an import share of 29 per cent.

For all the attention given to developing countries' clothing and textile exports, industrialized countries are still the major exporters. The EC is the world's largest exporter of clothing and textiles, accounting for 52 per cent of world trade, followed by the Asian NICs with 18.4 per cent. Italy is the world's largest individual exporting country (when aggregating both textiles and clothing) with a market share of 13.5 per cent (Table 4.2). For textiles, in 1986 the Federal Republic of Germany, Italy and Japan were the major exporters in the world market with shares of 8.1, 5.1 and 5.6 per cent, while for clothing Hong Kong, Italy and the Republic of Korea were the major exporters with shares of 8.4, 7.6 and 5.8 per cent (GATT 198d).