Geneva Switzerland will be the meeting place for the International Labor Organization (ILO) conference on October 24-26 th. The gathering of business and government leaders will entail a discussion of the results of a recent study released by the ILO. These in depth discussions will take place to explore the elimination of the quotas earlier this year which affected the apparel industry. Understandably the focus will be on the changes that have taken place since January of 2005.

Some of the observations from this study indicate that the previous fears and predictions surrounding the quota elimination have indeed come to fruition. Globally we have seen an increase in exports from countries such as Pakistan, India and most remarkably China. Other countries such as Belarus, Brazil, Egypt, Romania and Turkey are heavily affected by the changes.

This study further stated that job numbers in the United States and the European Union have declined, but Africa appears to have been hit the hardest in the quota-close out.

Please refer to the following source: www.ilo.org/public/english/bureau/inf/pr/2005/39.htm