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Sources of productivity growth in Australian textile and clothing firms

journal contribution
posted on 2007-09-01, 00:00 authored by Ikm Wadud
This paper estimates the sources of productivity growth in Australian textile and clothing firms based on the Business Longitudinal Survey (BLS) from 1995 to 1998. Productivity growth estimates have been obtained for each sub-category of textile and clothing firms. Sources of growth in multifactor productivity (MFP) are examined with growth in technical efficiency and scale effects based on estimates of stochastic frontier production functions. Separate estimates of output growth have been compared with the productivity growth estimates for each of the product categories. MFP improved in all clothing firms and declined in textile firms over 1997–1998 by four-digit level of Australia New Zealand Standard Industrial classification Scheme (ANZSIC). MFP declined in most major categories of both textile and clothing firms in 1995–1997. Changes in technical efficiency mostly dominated scale effects in the overall direction of MFPG in both textile and clothing firms. The findings of the study provide evidence for policies for improving the firms' operative performance in the ongoing liberalised regime.

History

Journal

Australian economic papers

Volume

46

Issue

3

Pagination

254 - 281

Publisher

Blackwell Publishing Asia

Location

Carlton, Vic.

ISSN

0004-900X

eISSN

1467-8454

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2007, The Author