The effect of globalisation on industrial districts in Italy: evidence from the footwear sector

mainly in favour of Ucraina. In Marche too, the preferred partner country for final
processing is Romania, but recently there have been growing imports of finished goods
from Ungary, who now accounts for more than 55% of pairs of shoes imported by
Fermano-Maceratese (Table 3). In Puglia, where outsourcing of final processing is less
relevant with respect to intermediate processing, the favorite partner country for imports
of finished goods is Albania (Table 3).

Relative quality of OPT

The literature on international trade points out that the main effects of globalisation
include a greater international competition through quality upgrading of exports.
Accordingly, countries would upgrade by supplying high-quality items, which do not
directly compete with those exported by developing countries. This type of functional
upgrading can be pursued by either leaving low-quality goods to other countries or by
delocalising low value added segments of production abroad, while carrying out high-
value added ones at home. A hypothesis that has been made to explain the long-
standing Italian specialisation in traditional manufacturing sectors - including the
footwear sector - is that the country has coped with increasing competition by emerging
economies by upgrading the quality of her exports⁶ and by delocalising some stages of
production abroad. This would imply a great share of vertical intra-industry OP trade, in
particular a higher quality of temporary exports with respect to the quality of temporary
imports.

⁶ Italy exports items of a relatively higher quality in many sectors, including the footwear sector, and the
quality of her exports has been increasing over time (Chiarlone, 2001).

11

<<   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   >>

More intriguing information