Marketing Strategy of Korean Textile Industry for US market in Post Korea-Us FTA era.

한미 FTA에 대비한 미국 섬유시장 진출 전략

Korea-Us FTA negotiation started in February 2006 with a view to overcoming those uncertainties in the global market and was finally concluded in April, 2007. The Agreement was officially signed between ministers two month later and it is expected to be ratified this year even though the process is most likely to be painful in both countries by the political resistances. For the new President of the United States, effective leadership will depends largely on how to encourage domestic industries such as Automobile industry and Iron and Steel industry from the financial crisis. Many trading partners of US worry about US foreign trade policy changes to protectionism that might be unequal to bear. Korea textile industry is one of the major industry in Korea as it occupies 15% of total number of manufacturers, 11% of total employment and 5% of national GDP. Korea-US FTA will provide a breakthrough for bouncing back by exploring new market. US agreed to remove all tariff and non-tariff barriers to 87% of textile items under trading. This study shows that Korean textile industry has been losing it's competitiveness as textile quota system abolished in the year 2005 and has been traced by pursuers such as China, India and Vietnam. In case of woven fabric which was a representing export item of Korea lost price competitiveness against China after 2005. This study seeks the strategy of Korea textile industry in the US market by utilizing the capacity of KOTRA offices in US. All possible statistical data obtained in the US were used for analysing the competitiveness. Fabrics and Garments are analysed independently with a view to finding out real trends of textile market in US. This study also suggest Korea's textile industry strategic ideas obtained from the potential buyers to show the way to penetrate into US market.