The Portuguese Footwear Industry Association (Apiccaps) has presented a formal document to the European trade commissioner, Peter Mandelson, and to its national minister for economics and innovation, Manuel Pinho, asking them to come to the aid of the footwear industry.

The document complains that 65% of the world population has, for various reasons, no access to European shoes, and that protectionism is destroying the creativity and competitiveness of the sector in Europe. The main obstacle the organisation would like the politicians to address is what it calls the system of quotas and other trade barriers European exporters come up against in trying to enter some important developing markets, while annual imports of shoes to Europe have increased by 157% in the last ten years.

Specifically, the document asks the European Commission to carry out a formal investigation into imports of shoes from the former Portuguese colony of Macao, which, according to Apiccaps, grew by 285% last year. The association alleges that exporting companies in China may have tried to by-pass anti-dumping measures that the European Commission imposed on leather shoe imports during 2006 by shipping from Macao instead.

It concludes that the opening up of external markets for European manufacturers and the imposition of stricter country-of-origin identification policies for all manufactured goods should be two of the themes Portugal takes up when it assumes the floating presidency of the European Union in the second half of this year.