Journal of the Asia Pacific EconomyWord文件下载.docx

1、There is little evidence that the suppliers are pursuing functional upgrading strategiesbesides the fact that they are flexible serving several customers at different markets.Keywords: garments; export; global value chains; VietnamJEL classifications: L67, O19, O24, O33IntroductionEconomic theory su

2、ggests that an export orientation strategy can provide countries withhigher economic growth. Integration into the world economy seems to be necessary fordeveloping countries wanting their economy to grow. Since its economic Doi Moi reformsin 1986,Vietnam has considered export the key to economic dev

3、elopment in order to narrowthe income gap to the developed countries. Vietnam possesses comparative advantages inlabour-intensive industries such as garment, footwear, furniture and so on. Among theseindustries, garment export has reported the largest export turnover, about US$7.8 billion in2007, an

4、d is now the countrys second largest export item after crude oil.However, international trade in garment has hardly ever been characterised by freetrade arrangements where comparative advantages would alone be the main driver for thelocation of production and distribution of exports. The Multi Fibre

5、 Agreement （MFA） putbarriers to free trade in garments but under WTOs Agreement on Textile and Clothing（ATC）, all quotas on the importation of textile and garment were eliminated among WTOmembers from the beginning of 2005. The abolition drastically changed the global contextof the garment industry.

6、 Although Vietnam became a WTO member only in 2007, it wouldbe affected by the change in the competitive condition at the global market.What would be the effects of the change for the global garment supplier countries? Theoverall demand for garments continued to increase in 2005 and brought about an

7、 increasein the overall global garment export. With the removal of quotas, garment export will notbe restraint, and so every country would have an opportunity to enhance its competitive.Email: hsm.iklcbs.dkISSN: 1354-7860 print / 1469-9648 onlineC _2009 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/135*785997Journal

8、 of the Asia Pacific Economy 163advantage and increase export. This situation also applied to Vietnam although it wasnot a WTO member then. However, although Vietnam has abundant cheap labour, can italso under the more intense competitive conditions manifest its comparative advantagewhen many other

9、developing countries are also producing relying on similar cheap labourconditions?In the new situation after the termination of the MFA in 2005, we expect Vietnamsgarment producers to review their strategies and enhance their capabilities to participate inthe global value chains （GVCs） under the mor

10、e competitive conditions in the internationaltrade environment. These challenges lead us to raise the following question: How hasVietnams garment export performed after 2005 and have the garment suppliers changedtheir strategies?The following section discusses the theoretical arguments for the impli

11、cations of globaltrade liberalisation and how competitive factors work for suppliers embedded in globalgarment value chains. This leads to a discussion of the expected consequences of thetermination of the quota systems under ATC. The third section analyses key features andoperational modes of the V

12、ietnamese garment industry. In the fourth section we analyse onthe basis of industry export and performance data the changes that have taken place after2004. The fifth section presents a micro-level analysis of supplier firms strategic reactionsto the changes based on primary collected company data.

13、 In the final section we concludeby summarising the findings to the posed research questions.Perspectives on liberalisation and competitionMoving from a quota-regulated trade regime to a liberalised one should according to simpleneo-classical trade economics ceteris paribus lead to a change in trade

14、 flows from countrieswith less price-competitive producers to countries having more of them. Since the quotasystems for garment imports to the US and EU in particular were quite elaborate, i.e.allocating quotas to a large number of exporting countries with significant variations inprice competitiven

15、ess, it could be expected that the removal of quotas would lead to amajor reorganisation of the trade flows and shifts in the garment export composition amongthe exporting countries. The widespread expectation was that well-established low costand efficient exporting countries with large capacities,

16、 such as China and India, would gainwhile many smaller developing countries that had mainly come into the global garment valuechains because of the quota systems would lose （Proksch 2004, A.T. Kearney 2005, Tewari2006）. Furthermore, the theoretical prediction would be that free trade would lead buye

17、rsto pressure prices downward. Such shifts would have repercussions on export earnings andemployment in the concerned countries.In anticipation of these changes, a lot of interest and concerns were raised about whowould likely win and who would lose?2 The outcome from these discussions reveals amore

18、 varied picture than the above trade theory argument. In the garment value chains,competition is not only about price but also about a whole range of other competitivefactors such as quality, delivery speed and certainty, production capacity and flexibility andtransport time and costs （Gereffi and M

19、emedovic 2003, Palpaceur et al. 2005）.Developmentof various capabilities, such as skills, management practices, and networking, that areimportant at the firm level appears to vary not only between regions but also among firmswithin the same country （Tewari 2006）. These factors together with other ri

20、sk elements maybe accommodated in neo-classical theory but it certainly makes the international buyerssourcing strategies more complicated and trade streams may not necessarily be diverted tothe most price-competitive suppliers. In addition to the competitive factors, a range of other164 H. Schaumbu

21、rg-Mullerstrategic considerations are made by the buyers. First, location considerations will makelarge buyers in particular to assess country risks and spread orders to different countriesto avoid a situation where unexpected developments in one country can harm their entiresupply. Secondly, there

22、can be substantial exit and shifting costs from abandoning suppliersin one country and shifting to new ones in other countries.When it comes to who wins and who loses, the overall assessment has been that Chinawill take it all. China has already become a global leader in garment export in most produ

23、ctcategories because its producers on average are the most competitive with respect to bothprice and quality. However, if we also take other competitive parameters and strategicconsiderations into account, the picture may be less obvious. Buyers may not want to put alltheir orders in China. Infrastr

24、ucture problems in China are rising, wages are rising and thegarment sector is not politically a priority sector for China. Buyers may also see a countryrisk in placing all their eggs in the China basket. Therefore, the broader picture says thatthere are still substantial opportunities for effective

25、 garment producers outside China.However, institutional trade arrangements will continue to divert the global garmentmarket from a completely freemarket situation. Importing countries will continue to protecttheir less efficient producers. Soon after the ATC was terminated on 1 January 2005,politica

26、l concerns were raised about the huge import surge from China into the US andEU, resulting in the introduction of export restraints agreements with China for garmentexports. Furthermore, preferential trade arrangements for specific developing countrieswere still allowed, for example, creation of pre

27、ferential access to the EU market or theAfrican Growth and Opportunity Act （AGOA） for producers in African countries to the USmarket.Garment manufacturing and firm strategiesTextile garment is a fast-growing industry in Vietnam, constituting around 15% of thecountrys total manufacturing production.

28、The garment exports have over several yearsshown double-digit annual growth rates. In the last couple of years, export figures haveexploded and reached US$4.8 billion in 2005, up from US$1.9 billion in 2001. The increasehas mainly been a result of the opening of the US market after the bilateral tra

29、de agreement（BTA） entering into force in 2001, but because of the steep growth the US introducedquotas for the import from Vietnam from early 2003. Main markets for Vietnams garmentexports had earlier been Japan without quotas and the EU with quotas.Both the textile and the garment subsectors have expanded production significantly overthe last 15 years. Together they currently employ more than 1.6 million people. The textilesector was earlier larger than the garment sect