Uncertain future for Asian textiles workers

08 Jun '05

2 min read

Textile manufacturers facing trouble in seeking cheap and skilled labour in Hong Kong due curbs on Chinese exports imports to US and EU markets.

However, blue-collar labour can be called from China into Macao, territory suffers from a shortage of factory managers because of the explosive growth of Macao's gaming industry.

Peter Liu, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong's textile and apparel committee, “basically, people don't want to work in the garment industry.”

Hong Kong was once a textile-manufacturing core, but now the situation has arise that many of its factories started moving to mainland and they are expecting revitalization in the trade.

It is expected that the Hong Kong's current competitive advantage in many textile products will weaken once the US and EU are no longer able to apply safeguards after 2008.

Henry Tan, chief executive of Luen Thai explained that people between the ages of 25 and 35 “it is better to work in the service industry.

As per Lee Cheuk Yan, General-Secretary of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions and a pro-democracy legislator, Blue-collar employment in textile industry, which employs up to 100,000 people, has fallen to about 20,000 from 300,000 nearly two decades ago.

Hong Kong-based textile executives informed that they would prefer to bring in workers from mainland China, but tight government controls make this difficult.

However textile me manufacturers opines, they are committed to producing in Hong Kong, with some investing in modern machinery to pull down their need for workers.