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HONG KONG GOVERNMENT INFORMATION SERVICES
HKK 12
1
2 8 DF
14 December 1977
EEC AND HONG KONG TEXTILES
On 3 December Hong Kong decided it had no choice but to accept restraints of its exports of textiles and clothing to the EEC for the next five years.
The new arrangements require in general a stabilisation of Hong Kong's exports for the next five years with very little provision for growth at the present depressed levels of trade. In four categories which constitute an important part of Hong Kong's exports, Hong Kong must cut back by up to 30 per cent of its 1976 exports. In cotton fabrics the level Hong Kong has had to accept for the EEC as a whole is well below the level which Hong Kong agreed for the UK alone in 1959.
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Hitherto restraint agreements have allowed opportunities · for steady growth although for highly sensitive products in the UK market this growth has been limited to one half of one per cent per annum Such arrangements have provided a stable, though restricted, basis for the development of an industry which has helped to support the 4.5 million people who live in this dependent territory. Hong Kong has no natural resources and must earn its living by making things other people want to buy.
Textile and clothing industries provide half the industrial jobs in Hong Kong. They account for half of its exports. The EEC is its biggest market for these products taking about one third.
Hong Kong sympathises with the current problems of the European textile industry and the high unemployment in Europe. However, Hong Kong feels that not much regard was had to the effects the present downturn in trade has had on the Hong Kong textile industry and will have in the years to come. Hong Kong believes the current textile problems in Europe cannot be attributed simply to imports nor solved by restraining some imports while leaving other suppliers unrestrained. Hong Kong has restrained textile exports first to the UK and then to member states of the EEC for some eighteen years.
In the recent negotiations the EEC's first requirement was cut imports from all developing countries back to a level the EEC judged necessary to give protection to this industry, that is to cut back to the 1976 levels of imports.
6 Grafton Street London W1X 3LB
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Phone 01-499-9821
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