A textile monitoring body (TMB) monitored the implementation of the agreements. It consisted of a Chairman and 10 members acting in their personal capacity. It monitored the measures taken under the agreement to ensure that they were consistent and reported to the Goods Council, which reviewed the implementation of the agreement before each new stage of the integration process. The Textiles Surveillance Body has also dealt with disputes under the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing. If not resolved, disputes could be referred to the WTO`s regular dispute settlement body. When the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing expired on 1 January 2005, the Textile Observatory also ceased to exist. The agreement was first concluded under the auspices of the then existing General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). The origins recognized both (1) the threat to industrial markets posed by cheap imports of clothing and textiles in terms of market disturbances and impact on their own producers, and (2) the importance of these exports to developing countries in terms of economic development and as a means of diversifying export earnings. The AMF was a global quota agreement that regulated international trade in textiles and clothing from 1974 to 1995. The MFA was administered under the auspices of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in Geneva, Switzerland. As a condition for the creation of the successor to the GATT, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the MFA was dissolved on 1 January 1995. After its termination, the agreement was phased out until all quotas were abolished in 2005.
China`s export profits will be reduced in the short term by the “safeguard mechanism” allowed by its 2001 WTO accession agreement. WTO members have the right, under certain circumstances, to limit the growth of their textile imports from China until 2008. To limit the interruption of ad hoc protection claims, the US and the EU concluded bilateral agreements with China in 2005. These agreements regulate trade in textiles largely like the MFA, although for a smaller number of products and with a higher level of imports. In addition, none of the other WTO exporters that were previously limited by MFA quotas are subject to such a restriction (see “China leads the world trade in textiles, but for how long?”). At that time, developing countries were still often heavily dependent on commodity exports. The agreement aimed to mitigate this potential conflict in order to ensure continued cooperation in international trade. In this context, quotas have been described as an orderly way to manage global trade in clothing and textiles in the short term in order to avoid market disturbances. The ultimate goal remained the removal of trade barriers and trade liberalization, with developing countries expected to play an increasing role in trade over time. In early 2005, China`s textile and clothing exports to the West increased by 100% or more for many items, prompting the US and the EU to cite China`s WTO accession agreement, which allows them to limit the growth rate to 7.5% per year by 2008. In June, China agreed with the EU to limit the rate to 10% for 3 years. No such agreement has been reached with the United States, which has instead introduced its own import growth rate of 7.5%.
[Citation needed] From 1974 until the end of the Uruguay Round, trade was subject to the Multifibre Arrangement (MFA). It was a framework for bilateral agreements or unilateral measures that set quotas that limited imports to countries whose domestic industries were severely affected by the rapid increase in imports. China`s role in world trade in textiles could be limited in the short term by the special safeguards of its accession to the WTO in 2001. These safeguard measures, which will remain in place until 2008, may limit the growth of Chinese exports of certain products at an annual rate of 7.5%. The United States applied these safeguard measures to a few products in 2003. Turkey and Argentina introduced more comprehensive safeguards immediately after the end of the Foreign Ministry, and Brazil announced its intention to restrict textile imports from China. In May 2005, the United States applied protections to trousers, cotton shirts and cotton underwear. In 2004, the EU took steps to increase its tariffs on clothing imports from China and, in June 2005, announced restrictions on 10 products imported from China. The US and the EU each negotiated new bilateral textile trade agreements with China in 2005 that could restrict Chinese exports to these markets until 2008. After the end of the multifibre agreement, China experienced a sharp increase in exports.
The US and the EU have called on the country to restrict trade as outlined in their accession agreement with the WTO. This has led to quota restrictions for a certain period of years between the US and the EU. Like NAFTA and the IWC, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) of 2000 granted low-income African countries preferential access as a form of economic assistance. This agreement allowed Kenya to export Lesotho and more than 30 other African countries, cotton pants and other products to the United States outside the AMF quota system. The adoption of AGOA has attracted investment and expertise – mainly from Asian companies – in the textile and apparel sector of these countries. Kenya`s cotton pants exports to the United States increased from 287,000 dozen pairs in 1998 to 3.1 million in 2004, and Kenya accounted for 2 percent of U.S. imports, twice as many as China. In this way, the MFA has indirectly encouraged the production of clothing in new corners of the world. In the 1970s, Hong Kong companies transferred resources to Mauritius when quota restrictions became binding.
In the 1980s, South Korean entrepreneurs began investing in Bangladesh. .
