Many textile producers in south China's economic powerhouse of Guangdong were forced to cut jobs by a large margin due to the lack of export orders in the year 2006.

From Jan. 1 this year, some categories of textile and garment products were placed with new export restrictions to the European Union (EU) countries and America, the markets of which accounted for 34 percent of all of China's textile exports in 2005.

The lack of export orders forced many textile producers, especially small and medium-sized companies to cut jobs or give leaves to workers ahead of China's important holiday of Spring Festival, which will fall on Jan. 29.

Owner of a garment factory in Foshan City of Guangdong said that the company has had to let go of over 300 workers, or about 30 percent of the workforce, which has formed a big contrast to the prosperous production atmosphere of last year.

There are some 6,200 textile companies in Foshan. However, only 76 of them have won textile export quota for this year.

In 2005, the elimination of global textile quota led to China's textile export surge to the EU countries and the United States, which caused trade disputes and rounds of talks.

The Sino-U.S. textile agreement taken effect as of Jan. 1, 2006 imposes quotas on a total of 21 types of clothing and textiles from China by 2008. Some ten kinds of Chinese textile and apparel products exported to the European Union have also been put under quota restrictions, according to an agreement reached by the two sides in June 2005.

The export restrictions impose threats to jobs of China's 19 million textile workers.

Editor: Yan