The textile and clothing manufacturing industry of Southern Africa is struggling to compete in a quote-free global market, reported IRIN, a UN humanitarian news and information service.

Countries like Lesotho and Swaziland, which had preferential access to the US market through the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), have been affected by the expiry of the global quota system.

So far more than 10 clothing factories have shut down in Lesotho since the beginning of this year. At least 10,000 workers, about 25% of Lesotho''s clothing workforce, lost their jobs.

South Africa''s clothing exports to the US under AGOA "have dropped quite substantially" from US$26 million in the first quarter of last year to US$12 million for the corresponding period this year, noted Eckart Naumann, an economist and associate of the nonprofit Trade Law Centre for Southern Africa.

However, the African clothing sector was simultaneously being flooded by garments "mostly from China", Naumann pointed out.

"This is because the EU and US have once again imposed restrictions on China to restrain its textile exports; as a result, goods en-route to these markets are being diverted to Africa," he said.

Osten Chulu, an economist with the UN Development Programme in Lesotho, pointed out that the southern Africa sector could never compete with China, which boasts not only low production costs, but also an artificially weakened currency.