Anti-dumping works, but China's market share goes up
14/03/2008
The anti-dumping measures the European Union has imposed on footwear with leather uppers from China and Vietnam have had an effect, but the two Asian countries still dominate shoe imports into Germany, and China's share of the German market has increased.
New figures from the Federation of the German Footwear Industry (HDS), revealed at the GDS exhibition in Dusseldorf, show that German retailers imported 13.5% more shoes—497.5 million pairs in all—in 2007, compared to the previous year.
Other European countries contributed 22.6% of this total, down from 27.9% in 2006. Specifically, Italy's share fell from 8.6% of total footwear imports into Germany to 7%, although it is still the most important source of European shoes for this market, followed by Portugal on 2.5%, and Romania and the Netherlands on 1.9% each.
Makers of leather footwear in Italy and Spain (sixth, behind even Slovakia) may be concerned that they have not grown the volume of shoes they sell in Europe's largest economy in spite of the anti-dumping measures.
The chairman of HDS, Ralph Rieker, said that the anti-dumping measures had reduced leather shoe imports from China and Vietnam, but that imports of non-leather shoes were "well up". He pointed out that the number of footwear manufacturers left in Germany had stayed the same at 55 companies but said these manufacturers had delivered some good news in 2007 by increasing their production output by 9.4% and their combined workforce by 4.5%.
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