© 2003 EAST-WEST University of THESSALY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Journal of Economics and Business Vol. VI – 2003, No 2 (63 – 88) Textiles in Central Eastern Europe and Russia: A comparative analysis in the European context Doris Hanzl and Peter Havlik The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (WIIW) 1 Abstract This paper deals with the situation of the textile sector in Russia and Central Eastern Europe, as well as with their EU trade in textiles. It gives a comparative analysis of the main sectoral economic trends, in particular regarding production and employment, factors affecting the competitiveness and the key features of the trade with the EU. The sector plays a relatively important role in economies of most CEECs (especially regarding employment and foreign trade), but is much smaller in Russia. There is also a significantly lower output per employee in Russia: the labour productivity is about 20% below the CEECs’ level. Textile sector exports from the CEECs take a prominent position on the European market, whereas those from Russia are extreme small. While the sector records trade surpluses with the EU in the CEECs, Russia has a large trade deficit in this 1 This paper was funded by the EU (EuropeAid-Tacis) RECEP IV Moscow, managed by Ivan Samson (Russian-European Centre for Economic Policy). End of redaction: June 2002.