The impact of the single market on women's employment in the textile and clothing industry

Directorate-General For Employment Social Affairs And Inclusion European Commission

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Labour market - free movement of workers

Informations

• Publié par: DIRECTORATE-GENERAL-FOR-EMPLOYMENT_SOCIAL-AFFAIRS-AND-INCLUSION-EUROPEAN-COMMISS
• Nombre de lectures: 14
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

Extrait

The impact of
the single market on
women's employment
in the textile and
clothing industry
COMMISSION OF
THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES
DIRECTORATE-GENERAL FOR
EMPLOYMENT, INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS
SUPPLEMENT 2/ AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS SOCIAL EUROPE
The impact of the single market
on women's employment in the textile
and clothing industry
SUPPLEMENT 2/91
* » *
* *
COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES
DIRECTORATE-GENERAL FOR EMPLOYMENT, INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS
AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS The information contained in this publication does not necessarily reflect either the position or views of the Commission
of the European Communities.
Luxembourg, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1991
© ECSC-EEC-EAEC, Brussels· Luxembourg, 1991
Reproduction is authorized, except for commercial purposes, provided the source is acknowledged.
Catalogue number: CE-NC-91 -002-EN-C
ISBN 92-826-2263-0
Printed in Belgium February 1990
Department of Applied
Economics
Free University Brussels
DULBEA
The impact of the Single
Market on women's
employment in the textile
and clothing industry
Summary Report
Daniele Meulders
and
Olivier Plasman
Expert Network
"Women in employment"
Phase 7. Table of contents
Preface 1
~t '·
Foreword 3
1. Economic aspects 6
A. The evolution in production
B. External trade 19
C. Consumption 26
D. Conclusion : The restructuring of the textile-clothing sector 2
2. Employment
A. The evolution in employment
Β. The women's share of employment 3
3. The structure of employment 40
A. Atypical employments
A.l. Independent employment
A.2. Part-time work7
A.3. Temporary work9
A.4. Homework 5
A.5. Conclusion1
B. Salaries and qualifications2
B.l. Wages
B.2. Qualifications4
C. Conclusion : Reorganisation of production and employment
evolution
4. Women's employment in European textile-clothing, perspective
1992 : the Single Market, the Multi-Fibre Agreements 60
Introduction 6
A. Effects of the Single Market's completion on the textile-clothing
sector1
A.l. Sensitive sectors
A.2. Direct effects : the white book measures3
A.3. Structural effects of the single market 64
A.4. The Multi-Fibre Agreements : the significance of extra-
European trade for textile-clothing5
Β. Perspectives 1992 : the Single Market, the Multi-Fibre Agreements,
textile-clothing and female employment8
C. Conclusion : The Single Market - What future for female
employment in textile-clothing ? 7
General conclusion 80
Bibliography3
List of graphs 95
List of tables6
Annex 17
Annex 2 13
Annex 31 - ι -
PREFACE
The completion of the internal market, which is helping to boost growth in the
European Community, is also essential to the creation of jobs. Eight and a half million
jobs have been created since 1985 when the 1992 target was launched and the
strengthening of European integration has played a crucial role in this process.
Although the effect of completion of the internal market is positive, as confirmed
by the results of the studies the Commission organized in the context of the Cecchini
Report on the "Cost of non-Europe", which put the overall job creation potential at
between two and five million, there is no guarantee that this gain will be automatically
distributed throughout the Community. Imbalances can occur at different levels :
sectoral, regional and between specific groups of workers. To ensure that any resulting
tension v*mld be detected as rapidly as possible, the Commission has launched a number
of in-depth studies over recent years on the consequences of completion of the internal
market. One of these studies, entitled "The impact of the internal market by industrial
sector : the challenge for the Member States" was published recently as a special, joint
issue of Social Europe and European Economy.
This study highlighted the nature of the challenges for industry in each Member
State by means of structural adjustment scenarios and demonstrated in particular that the
challenges facing the Community's most industrialized countries are different from those
facing the less-developed Member States. For the former, they are concerned mainly
with firms' ability to become truly European, at all levels of management, research and
development, production, marketing and distribution. Two main paths are a priori open
to the less-developed countries : specialization in the traditional industries where they are
competitive at present or the emergence of new sectors with higher technological content.
In the latter countries, the textile and clothing industry gives and will continue to give
cause for concern.
The data collected by the Commission, some of which was set out in the Report
on Employment in Europe for 1989, reveals that the completion of the internal market
will affect both male and female employment. In recent years women's participation in
employment and in the Community economy has risen sharply : at present more than
40 % of Europe's wage and salary earners are women. But the pattern of women's
participation in differnt industrial sectors is far from uniform. The proportion of women
in the industrial sectors most sensitive to the completion of the internal market varies from -2 -
less than 10 % in heavy industries like shipbuilding to more than 75 % in sectors like
textiles.
Because of the high concentration of women in certain industries, like textiles,
specific consideration must be given to the changes that the completion of the internal
market could bring to female employment. In 1989 DG V's Equal Opportunities Unit
asked the members of the expert's network "Women in employment" to study the effects
of the completion of the internal market on women's employment in the textile industry.
Twelve reports have been prepared, each one setting forth the results of the studies on the
effects of the completion of the internal market on the employment of women in the textile
and clothing industry. Mrs D. Meulders has drawn up a summary report for the
Community as a whole.
This report is the first Community study on the impact of the internal market on
female employment. A second study on the repercussions of the internal market on the
banking industry has just been completed. It was also prepared by the experts' network
"Women in employment".
The results of the study clearly demonstrate that a whole series of factors, such as
the pursuit of European economic integration, the introduction of new technologies and
the internationalization of trade, will alter the structure of the textile industry and its
production processes. Companies which have as yet been unable to anticipate these new
constraints will have to make substantial efforts to adapt; this will involve the low-skilled
in the main and this groupe comprises a large percentage of women. Steps must be taken
to avoid the development of practices whereby the price paid to maintain competitiveness
is failure to comply with statutory terms of employment or conditions pursuant to
agreements. To combat such moves, the report concludes by insisting on the need to
provide the low-skilled with facilities for retraining or for acquiring the skills demanded
by the new production processes. -3 -
Foreword
Experts working on the Cecchini report have assessed the macroeconomic effects
of the Single Market's completion on the basis of simulations which took into account the
suppression of borders, the opening-up of public contracts, the opening of the capital
market and supply effects. Employment-wise, 1 800 000 jobs would be created in the
"no spillover" scenario or some 5 000 000 in the "spillover" scenario, that is, using the
25% savings due to the freeing of intra-European trade. But little information is available
on the specific type of employment that would be created, in which region of the EEC, or
on which components of the labour force (men, women, skilled or unskilled, migrant
workers, ...) would benefit from this (supposed) growth in employment. And if "global
economic" effects were the subject of extensive analyses and simulations at national or
Community level, qualitative analyses remain rather scarce.
The experts network "women in employment", faced with uncertainty about the
impact of the Single Market on female employment, surveyed in greater detail two heavily
female-user sectors : textile-clothing and banks/financial institutions. The former is the
main outlet for women's employment in industry; the latter is a significant provider of
female employment in the tertiary sector.
This study will focus on 1992's impact on female employment in the textile-cloth­
ing sector, the bank sector will be the subject of a later report. Particular care was brought
to the qualitative side of employment : status, remuneration, qualifications.
This report stems from eleven studies led in the EEC's member countries by the
experts of the "women in employm