At the end of 2004, Humen Town, China's famous town for women's dress, had been confronted with a new round of challenge aroused by competition. On January 1, 2005, the lifting of textile quotas will be causing great effect in the global textile industry, and China's textile exporting will soar at a overwhelming rate, offering an impetus for the strong demand of relevant raw materials at the same time. During this new round of competition, what future plans are Humen, the largest women's dress production base in the country, pondering on in order to bring a splendid future for itself?

Due to the above suspense, Guangdong textile industry has been bestowed with a great deal of mystery.

Suspense 1: the global textile circle: who is able to lead this industry after textile quota lifting?

Humen Textile and Garment industry is facing a critical moment right before the elimination of textile quotas. On January 1, 2005, with the termination of ¡§Textile and Clothes Agreement¡¨, textile and garment quotas will be eliminated in an all-around way, offering the domestic towns famous for textile and garment business a hard-won opportunity for future development by breaking its chokepoint. Now the local government and the garment association are confronted with a tough challenge: how to lead Humen garment industry to win its way to the international market and be a winner?

With the advent of textile quota elimination and the entering of foreign garment brand names, a new round of fierce competition is coming. Despite the size of the town, which has only 110,000 registered population, the annual sales revenue in garment and textile has exceeded 12 billion RMB Yuan; however, under the new environment, how to make its local garment brands maintain fast and sound development in the long run has still remained to be a topic to be discussed by the local government and garment industry.

Given this, it has been pointed out by Humen garment and finery industry that, now this industry is facing three opportunities: one is that after the textile quota elimination, many textile products of fine quality and low price will make their entry into any country and the international textile resources will undergo a more orderly market configuration, which shall mark the beginning of a more fair and free trading era; secondly, in the post-quota era, the course of integration in this industry will lead to the overall advancement, bringing greater development for global textile industry; thirdly, the competitive edge of China's textile industry brought about by its fine quality and low price will be brought out into full play and displayed to the greatest length, and China will be the biggest beneficiary of textile quota elimination.

All of these are based on theoretical reasoning; in fact, in post-quota era, the disadvantages existing inside Humen garment industry might perhaps make itself hard to move forward. It has been accurately pointed out by experts that, despite its great regional influence, Humen textile and garment industry lack national or even international recognition. Besides, they are short of a systematic quality assessment instrument and technology, and its products are hard to reach exporting requirements, all of which are likely to cause obstacles for this industry to cope with its new trading environment, both in terms of ecological protection and technological innovation.

While amidst people's cheering for the abandoning of textile quota, Humen garment industry is confronted with this challenge: as a top leading role player in Guangdong textile industry, how can it make it way abroad and win worldwide appreciation and wealth?

Suspense two: who is able to play a leading role in Guangdong textile community and revitalize this industry?

Another important fact: with the elimination of textile quota, China's textile industry will be undergoing a series of reforms amid fierce competitive situation. A great many new textile companies are emerging in provinces like Guangdong, Zhejiang, Shandong, Jiangsu, and under this critical situation, people were wondering about the possibilities of Humen textile community in leading and revitalizing Guangdong textile industry.

Different places among textile industries are competing for technology and management. In march this year, with the publishing of ¡§Competitiveness research report of Guangdong textile industry¡¨ , the greatest weakness of Guangdong textile industry was made public for the first time: including slow upgrading speed and a high level of depreciation, a poor quality of business operation, and even some indices are below the national average; and the advantages in loan paying abilities and circulation are becoming weakened. At the same time, some local governments are eager for success and instant benefit, which has led to the backward position of its development potential. Some experts, then, has estimated that, Zhejiang province may surpass Goangdong in textile exporting.

This estimation turned out to be true. According to customs statistics, in the first half of this year, the total exporting revenue of Guangdong textile amounted to 8.186 billion USD, 9.44% more than the same period last year and for the first time in more than ten years, ranking second. The first place was snatched by Zhejiang province, with a total exporting revenue of 8.785 billion USD and a development rate of 32.31%, which fully illustrated its strong momentum. According to Du Yuzhou, head of China textile industry committee, only by diversifying its products and following a small-scale production method with high quality can Guangdong textile industry walk out of the present predicament.

suspense 3: who is ready to become the leader amidst the present textile upgrading?

In addition, in post-quota era, the focus of China's textile competition is gradually shifting from low cost and low price strategy to high quality and technology methodology, with a view to enhancing its overall upgrading. As an important factor in garment industry, the performance of cloth providing will be playing a critical role in the post-quota era. This is extremely true for Humen Cloth and Garment industry.

According to statistics, Humen now has over 1000 garment manufacturing factories and more than 8600 garment trading shops, with an annual output of clothes more than 100,000,000 units or pieces. It enjoys mass production advantages, and is considered to be the leader of southern China garment industry. However, it still has its own weaknesses, which shall never be neglected.

lmost 70% of the cloth being used by over 1000 local garment manufacturing enterprises comes from outside markets. A great number of these enterprises are now still paying little attention to its neighboring markets for cloth purchasing. The big cloth market in Humen now was built in 1997, and it comprises six markets, including Humen cloth market, Huacheng cloth market, Flourishing cloth market and Xiangjiang cloth market etc. However, after years of development, their customers are mainly from the neighboring regions or local companies.

Cloth providing exerts a great deal of importance for garment industry, and if it fails to form strong competitiveness, it will definitely affect the development of garment industry. Obviously, the cloth industry in Humen is far from being able to match the development of its garment industry. Besides, the local cloth still belongs to the category of lower grade, a far cry from world advanced brands, and if Humen intends to forge its own brands in its garments, it should pay much attention to the development of its cloth.

Needless to say, during this competition among Guangdong textile industry, the scale of Humen cloth trading will, to a large extent, play a decisive role in the future of its garment industry. As a matter of fact, a large number of Humen cloth trading enterprises have grown up amidst a backward situation, chiefly township enterprises and private enterprises, and this has inevitably caused many problems to the cloth market, for instance, carelessness in planning, inaccurate supplement, and backwardness in management and so on.

Who is ready to survive the present situation and lead this industry in the enhancement and upgrading of this industry before textile quota elimination? This has attracted a great deal of attention.

Authoritative opinions:

Humen dominating post-quota era
The competition in cloth plays a key role

Right before the elimination of textile quota, the competition in the garment industry has become the competition of cloth, which has been widely recognized by the entire industry. Sales experts pointed out that the development of the entire garment and textile industry will influence the prosperity of the entire industrial chain. And this industrial chain follows a ¡§Shackle Theory¡¨, the weakest section determines the total strength of the entire chain. Judging from other world famous garment cities, they all have their own cloth supply system, or at least they enjoy advantages in cloth providing channels and designing. Therefore, some insiders argue that the prior stage of China's textile development has been achieved by the low cost of domestic cloth and the competitiveness of foreign cloth providers.