The Ending of the Multifibre Arrangement: A Development Boon for the South?

Abstract

This article offers an assessment of the impact of the ending of the Multifibre Arrangement (MFA) – the protectionist trade regime that shielded developed countries from developing country textiles and clothing exports between 1974 and 2004. Over the past decade the ending of the MFA has been widely anticipated and a range of quantitative studies already purport to show a clear link between textiles liberalisation and significant trade gains for the developing countries. Despite this, the existing literature has had relatively little to say about the distribution of these gains, while failing to acknowledge that a number of developing countries were actually better off when quotas were still in place. This article seeks to examine more closely the distributional effects of the ending of the MFA by focusing on these cases. Ultimately, it is argued that while the ending of the MFA may eventually lead to significant welfare gains for the South as a whole, these are likely to be highly skewed in favour of a r...