2002 Volume 11 Issue 1 Pages 1-14
The aim of this research is to present recommendations regarding transformation of the towel industry in Osaka area so that it can grow concurrently with increasing importation of towel products. For this purpose, we undertook a cybernetics/system approach to analyzing characteristics of the industry and its current problems through a field survey. The Osaka towel production firms are not only the number of the firms but also the amount of production has been decreasing since 1991, so that they applied for the textile safeguard to the WTO in February 2001. We define a transformation system is basically the learning system proposed by the SSM with VSM incorporated. From this viewpoint, we conducted on questionnaire analysis for manager’s senses and in-depth interview for a relevant system of the production firms. It is discovered that both the manager’s sound management and the manufacturing system had been effective until now, but they turned out to be lacking the requisite variety toward the complexities that have come from the diffusion of IT and economic globalization. We demonstrated a need for rational transformation to the industrial structure from the existing division of labor production to the coordinated supply system, in order to lead the industry out of the local maximum trap.
Moreover the role of the government will become more significant in adjusting the balance of import and export of products, based on welfare in a global free trade.
