MANILA -Textile and garments exports rose by about five percent in the first 10 months of 2005, indicating that the industry was prospering despite the expiration of the Multifibre Arrangement, a trade official said yesterday.

Exports from January to October in 2005 hit about $2.13 billion compared to $2.02 billion in 2004, an official from the government's Garment and Textiles Export Board said.

Exports to the United States, the country's largest market, fell by about two percent in the period to $1.6 billion, board officer Carlo Isla said.

But the drop was compensated by exports to the European Union which rose by about 23 percent to $246 million and exports to markets not previously covered by MFA quotas, which rose 69 percent to $198 million, said Isla.

The MFA, established in the mid-1970s, allocated quotas of clothing and textiles that developing nations with cheap labor can export to rich countries but it expired in January, 2005.

The Philippine government had originally forecast that garment and textile exports would increase by eight percent in the whole of 2005, expecting growth in exports to slow after the MFA's expiration on January 1, 2005.

However, Isla said the Philippines was taking advantage of the end of the MFA to expand its markets and even boost apparel exports to countries such as the United States where it had once been limited by quotas.*AFP

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