In 1989, the year of the profound change for the whole Czechoslovak economy triggered a decline in the textile industry. The Velvet Revolution, despite the name, ironically seemed to upset the whole textile sector.
With the start- up of the economic transformation in 1990, the textile and clothing industrial structures became one of the most afflicted ones among all Czech manufacturing industries. The output in the knitting and clothing industry has been dramatically falling since 1990. At the end of 1993 the decline was - 58% in textile, -54% in knitwear, -66% in clothing industries. The reasons standing behind the decline were the lack of technologies, expensive labour, production of low quality products, low unit export prices on the hard currency markets and last but not least a flooded textile market with cheap goods coming from Asia. Despite the falling production in the whole industrial sector and its shrinking share on GDP after 1989, textile and clothing still play an important role in Czech economy.
Thanks to the effort of textile producers in the last decade, steps have been taken to sustain the international competition and to bring the previous fame of textile industry back. New producers have been trying to change the poor image of their products by hiring reputable designers, using high quality materials, advanced colouring and design technologies, controlling the precision of handwork, as well as improving on marketing techniques and servicing the customer.
The growth of the textile industry in the Czech Republic depends not only on export competitiveness, but also on creativity. Only those who specialize in high quality products survive.
The turnover of the textile and clothing sector grew in 2014 by 8.4%, to a total of 51 billion crowns, but since 2000 a reduction by two-thirds in the production, and the loss of 37,000 jobs has been reported. What unites the textile enterprises is the dependence on export. The main purchaser is Germany, in addition to being the leading supplier of raw materials, followed by Turkey, the US and Russia. Yet foreign trade has had a deficit since 2004. The deficit in 2014 reached a record level of 15.5 billion crowns, as noted by the Czech Office of Statistics. The direct cause is an increasingly large import of cheap goods, mostly from China and Bangladesh.
What remains of the great factories of the twentieth century are dozens of buildings in ruins, ready to be converted into offices and residential complexes.
In 1989, a year of change for the whole Czech economy, the decline of the textile industry started. The City of Brno lost its leading position taken over by a number of manufacturing facilities seated in Liberec, which from the nineteenth century had been the second biggest textile centre of the country and boasts a reputable textile college
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The most intensive changes were influenced by the loss of foreign trade demand which already started in the mid of 1990 and caused a loss of output in manufacturing. The fall in production continued in 1992 and 1993, though at the end of that year there was a visible stabilization in some segments of the textile industry and clothing sector due to the successful privatisations of former Czech textile plants. Some of the enterprises were taken over by foreign investors, e.g. in 1994 Marzotto, an Italian company, merged Mosilana, nowadays Nova Mosilana, the only one to continue the weaving tradition.
The changes after November 1989
In 1989, the year of the profound change for the whole Czechoslovak economy triggered a decline in the textile industry. The Velvet Revolution, despite the name, ironically seemed to upset the whole textile sector.
With the start- up of the economic transformation in 1990, the textile and clothing industrial structures became one of the most afflicted ones among all Czech manufacturing industries. The output in the knitting and clothing industry has been dramatically falling since 1990. At the end of 1993 the decline was - 58% in textile, -54% in knitwear, -66% in clothing industries. The reasons standing behind the decline were the lack of technologies, expensive labour, production of low quality products, low unit export prices on the hard currency