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



which are registered as temporary exports or imports (outward processing trade, OPT),
we analyse international delocalisation with data on OPT at the provincia level.

This section will focus on selected shoe clusters which resorted most of all to
international outsourcing as a way to reduce production costs. These clusters are
concentrated in Veneto (Riviera del Brenta, Verona, Treviso), Puglia (Barletta, Salento)
and Marche (Fermano-Maceratese). Taken together, these regions account for the vast
majority (almost 90%) of all international outsourcing activities carried out by the
Italian footwear industry (respectively, 58.7% in Veneto, 23.2% in Puglia and 5.0% in
Marche in 2002) (ANCI, 2003).

2.1 Overview on OPT data.

Data on flows of outward processing trade (OPT) for the Italian footwear sector
have been collected since 1996 by ANCI (Associazione Nazionale Calzaturifici
Italiani). Until the first half of 2001, the Italian Ministry of Foreign Trade
(MINCOMES) was in charge of collecting applications for OPT operations by Italian
firms. Since July 1st 2001, the Customs Agency (Agenzia delle Dogane) has been in
charge of reporting on actual temporary trade flows under the special OPT regime. This
switch has implied several changes in the available data as well as in the comparability
of old with new data. The major positive change refer to the nature of the available data:
the ‘old’ regime provided data on the amounts for which firms applied for OPT
operations, whereas in the ‘new’ regime actual amounts are registered. The data
collected in the old regime were the number of imported uppers and shoes, the value of
exported production for processing, and the value of processing outsourced abroad; the
data collected since July 1st 2001 are much more detailed as they include both export
and import flows of both shoes and components (number of pairs, number of operations
and total value). All the old and new data are available at the regional level and at the
provincia” level and provide information on bilateral flows to each partner country.
Although this switch represents a major improvement as for data availability and
reliability, the two data sets are not comparable. As a consequence, the following
analysis will provide an overview of the major trends during the last half of the 1990s
(based on the old data) and then discuss the new available evidence in greater detail.



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