Comparative Advantage of Yarn and Weaving Industries: Evidence for Türkiye and Top Exporters

Abstract With the repeal of the MFA agreement, the competitive conditions in yarn and weaving industries have changed. Especially, with the cheap labour of Asian and Far Eastern countries, they have become advantageous in this unrestricted competition environment. Therefore, this study was conducted to help to identify those products where Türkiye and her competitors have comparative advantages. This study mainly focuses on analysing the complementarity and substitutability of selected countries such as Türkiye, India, China and the USA. RTA, RC, RSCA and trade specialisation (TSI) indices were used to evaluate the competitive advantage. The results showed that Türkiye’s competitiveness in cotton yarn and cotton weaving has deteriorated. However, India and China, which are the major countries in the world’s cotton production, have a positive impact on their long-term competitiveness. Moreover, for these countries there is convergence in cotton yarn and divergence in cotton fabric products.