Sewing Success? Employment, Wages, and Poverty following the End of the Multi-Fibre Arrangement

The global textile and apparel sector is critically important as an early phase in industrialization for many developing countries and as a provider of employment opportunities to thousands of low-income workers, many of them women. The goal of this book is to explore how the lifting of the Multi-fibre Arrangement/ Agreement on Textiles and Clothing (MFA/ATC) quotas has affected nine countries Bangladesh, Cambodia, Honduras, India, Mexico, Morocco, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam with the broader aim of better understanding the links between globalization and poverty in the developing world. Analyzing how employment, wage premiums, and the structure of the apparel industry have changed after the MFA/ATC can generate important lessons for policy makers for economic development and poverty reduction. This book uses in-depth country case studies as the broad methodological approach. In-depth country studies are important because countries are idiosyncratic: differences in regulatory context, history, location, trade relationships, and policies shape both the apparel sector and how the apparel sector changed after the end of the MFA. In-depth country studies place broader empirical work in context and strengthen the conclusions. The countries in this book were chosen because they represent the diversity of global apparel production, including differences across regions, income levels, trade relationships, and policies. The countries occupy different places in the global value chain that now characterizes apparel production. Not surprisingly, the countries studied in this book represent the diversity of post-MFA experiences. This book highlights four key findings: The first is that employment and export patterns after the MFA/ATC did not necessarily match predictions. This book shows that only about a third of the variation in cross-country changes in exports is explained by wage differences. While wage differences explain some of the production shifts, domestic policies targeting the apparel sector, ownership type, and functional upgrading of the industry also played an important role. Second, changes in exports are usually, but not always, good indicators of what happens to wages and employment. While rising apparel exports correlated with rising wages and employment in the large Asian countries, rising exports coincided with falling employment in Sri Lanka. Third, this book identifies the specific ways that changes in the global apparel market affected worker earnings, thus helping to explain impacts on poverty. Fourth, in terms of policies, the countries that had larger increases in apparel exports were those that promoted apparel sector upgrading; those that did not promote upgrading had smaller increases or even falling exports.

Bibliographic Details

Main Authors:	Lopez-Acevedo, Gladys, Robertson, Raymond
Format:	Publication biblioteca
Language:	en_US
Published:	Washington, DC: World Bank 2012-03-14
Subjects:	absolute terms, access to government, age distribution, aging populations, basic benefit, basic needs, basic pension, benefit level, Benefit Levels, Center for Population, changes in fertility, Chronic Poverty, chronically poor, Consumption poverty, consumption smoothing, contribution records, coresidence, Cultural Change, demographic change, Demographic projections, Demographic Transition, demographic trends, dependency ratio, Dependency Ratios, determinant of poverty, determinants of poverty, Developing Countries, dissemination, economic growth, Economic Transition, Elderly, Elderly Households, elderly men, elderly people, elderly persons, elderly population, elderly women, employment opportunities, Employment Status, family income, family members, family planning, Family Planning Commission, family size, Family Support, farm labor, fertility, Fertility Policies, fertility rate, fertility rates, funded pensions, future generations, global population, government pensions, gross domestic product, guaranteed rate, health care, health insurance, higher incidence of poverty, Household Consumption, Household Head, household income, household incomes, Household Poverty, human capital, Human Development, ill health, illness, incidence of poverty, income distribution, income inequality, Income poverty, Income Quintile, Income Risk, income shock, income support, Individual Account, Individual Accounts, Inflation Rate, informal sector, intergenerational transfers, internal migration, Labor Force Participation, labor income, labor market, labor markets, Labor Supply, legal status, life expectancy, living conditions, local capacity, local development, local economy, low fertility, Male Labor Force, Migrant, migrant family, migrant workers, Migrants, Migration, mortality, National Fertility, national level, national pension, national policy, Nutrition, Old Age, Old Age Support, Old-Age, older people, Pension, Pension Benefit, pension benefits, pension coverage, pension income, Pension Indicators, pension policy, Pension Policy Reform, Pension Programs, Pension Scheme, pension schemes, Pension System, Pension Systems, pensionable age, Pensions, persistent poverty, Policy makers, Policy Research, Policy Research Working Paper, policy response, Political Economy, Poor, Poor Areas, Poor People, Poor Rural Households, poorer households, Population and Development, population census, Population Center, Population Growth, population growth rate, Population Projections, Population Research, Population Statistics, population structure, Population Trends, poverty assessment, poverty gap, poverty head, poverty incidence, Poverty index, poverty level, Poverty Line, Poverty Measures, Poverty Poverty, poverty rate, poverty rates, poverty severity, poverty status, Private Transfers, public policy, public support, reduction in poverty, remittance, remittances, respect, Retirement, retirement ages, retirement decisions, Rural, rural areas, Rural Economy, Rural Household, rural incomes, rural men, rural migrants, rural people, rural poor, Rural Population, Rural Population Growth, rural populations, rural poverty, rural residents, rural workers, safety nets, savings, Social Affairs, social assistance, Social Insurance, Social Pension, Social Pensions, Social Protection, social protection mechanisms, Social Sciences, Social Security, social security benefits, social security system, social services, social support, social welfare, spatial differences, spillover, spouse, State University, support falls, targeting, United Nations Population Division, Urban Areas, urban migration, urban population, urbanization, village leaders, Vulnerability, Vulnerability to Poverty, Working-Age Population, World Population, Young adult, young adults, young people,
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/13137
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