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The decline of Hebron’s shoe industry

The local business of shoe-making used to sustain Hebron, but now cheap imports have flooded the market.

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Hebron's markets are today filled with shoes imported from China. Although industry workers say the imports are of a much lower quality than local products, they are also much cheaper.
By Rich Wiles
Published On 4 Apr 2015

Hebron, occupied West Bank – In a small office above his shoe sole factory, Tareq Abu Felat talks passionately about the industry that sustained the Palestinian city of Hebron for decades.

“Every single house in the city used to get direct or indirect income from the industry,” he told Al Jazeera. “In the ‘golden days’, at least 35,000 people were working in more than 1,000 workshops across the city.”

Those who worked in Hebron’s shoe-making industry at the time – between the 1970s and early 1990s – represented about one third of the city’s population. But the signing of the Oslo Accords and the 1994 Paris Economic Protocol opened the doors, under full Israeli control, for the mass importation of Chinese goods to occupied Palestine. The Palestinian Authority (PA) welcomed this without the necessary regulation. 

Abu Felat, who chairs the Palestinian Federation of Leather Industries, believes the many containers of Chinese products that enter Hebron daily must be more strictly regulated in order to defend local businesses and consumers: “The government did not think about this when they allowed this to happen. The consumers found new styles and much cheaper alternatives to local shoes, but they are also much lower quality and lack health and safety testing.”

Although the PA ultimately put import taxes on Chinese products, Abu Felat said more must be done. The Palestinian Bureau of Statistics estimated in 2013 that as many as 90 percent of the shoes in Palestine’s markets were Chinese.

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Less than 300 shoe-making workshops remain open in the city today, employing between 3,000 and 4,000 people in a city that today houses more than 170,000 Palestinians. Workshops run only part-time, and the vast majority of all business goes directly to Israel, where a better economic climate allows consumers to purchase the higher-quality shoes made in Hebron.

Tareq Abu Felat, chairman of the Palestinian Federation of Leather Industries, says the industry has been let down by the Palestinian Authority. But he continues to struggle for its future and its workers: 'The people of Hebron invested their history and their future in this industry. The federation is fighting for this future. If we are going to die, we will not die silently.'
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Hebron's remaining workshops only run part-time - two to four days per week, depending on the season and contracts. Many current workers are looking to leave the industry to find more stable employment with a guaranteed income.
More than half of all the shoes made in Hebron go straight to Israeli markets today. Some exports are sent to Jordan, Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, leaving less than a quarter of the product in the Palestinian marketplace.
Some former factory owners moved over to importing once they were forced to close their factories due to the lack of work. Despite knowing that this would only add to the industry's decline, they say they knew nothing else but the shoe industry and felt they were left with no alternative.
Shareef al-Atrash manages the Rally shoe factory, which has been unable to secure contracts with the Israeli firms on which the local industry relies. 'We don't have permits to enter Israel so have been unable to secure contracts there. The current financial problems [Israel's withholding of PA taxes] have only made things worse; people don't have any money to spend.'
The International Monetary Fund recently reported that 2014 saw the first drop in Palestinian GDP since 2006, along with rising unemployment that now averages 27 percent across the occupied territories. This economic climate only adds to the pressure on Hebron's shoe industry.
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Rafiq Abu Daoud believes that the PA must do more to protect Palestinian businesses from the effects of mass imports. 'When the government really wants to change things, it can by bringing in quality-control standards. We are working for this to happen and this will protect consumer rights, such as health and safety,' he said.
The Palestinian Federation of Leather Industries believes that at least 25 percent of Chinese imports would be refused if quality-control standards were put in place. Such regulation would protect consumers and help to rebuild the industry through increasing local production.
The industry historically relied upon local leather and imports from Arab states. Hebron's tanneries have been banned from importing raw hides from Gaza since the second Intifada began, and Israel also prohibits them from internationally importing raw hides. Access is now restricted to raw hides from the West Bank, which cannot meet the local industry's demands.
Waleed Zatari manages one of the 13 remaining tanneries in Hebron. He says Israel has banned the importation of chemicals essential to the leather-making process in the West Bank. 'If we cannot find a way to solve this in the coming weeks, we are finished,' he said.
Today, more than 75 percent of the leather used in Hebron's shoe industry is imported. Italy, Turkey and India are among the main exporters of leather used in Palestinian workshops.
Chinese imports have higher profit margins than locally produced shoes. The lower quality also means less durability and more frequent purchases, so the current status quo presents a win-win situation for sellers of Chinese shoes.
The Dana factory in the village of Dura near Hebron was forced to close in the late 1990s due to its inability to compete price-wise with Chinese imports. After securing a major Israeli contract, the factory reopened, and today it works exclusively for one Israeli company. After finishing products, workers add 'Made in Israel' labels to their women's shoes.
The lack of control on Chinese imports has left the industry in tatters today and reliant upon Israel for its survival. The Palestinian Federation of Leather Industries estimates that each container that arrives into Hebron filled with Chinese shoes takes up to six months' work away from a group of Palestinian workers.