End of the Line? Globalisation and Fiji’s Garment Industry

Abstract

Introduction The Fijian garment industry has had a short and often turbulent history. A product of the post-1987 coup strategy of export-led economic development coupled with key preferential trading arrangements, it experienced a dramatic early growth. The industry rapidly became a critical part of the economic structure of Fiji, often surpassing sugar as the number-one export sector. Immediately before the 2000 coup, about 105 factories were employing 18,000 to 20,000 workers and were exporting more than $F300 million in garments to Australia, the USA, Europe and New Zealand. This accounted for an estimated 28 per cent of local weekly waged employment (Keith-Reid 2001). Not only was the industry important in terms of providing employment to some of the estimated 17,000 annual new entrants into the labour market (new formal sector jobs typically average 2,000 annually), it was recognised as the largest employer of urban low-income earners in the country. From 1997 to 2001, garments replaced sugar as the country’s leading export sector, accounting for an average 26 per cent of total exports (MoF and National Planning 2002: 15). It was even hoped that the Textiles, Clothing and Footwear (TCF) sector would reach $F1 billion in exports in 2005, that employment would reach 30,000, and that the industry would be in a position to move beyond its reliance on preferential trade agreements and its dependence on Australasia and the USA (FTIB 1999).