In a joint declaration, representatives from ten footwear associations in Latin America started by expressing their concern about the impact of Covid-19 on the sustainability of footwear companies, on the employment and the entire value chain. The entities expressed their will to cooperate with the authorities with an aim to create reintegration strategies to go back to normality and to design commercial defence measures to contain the entry of footwear from Asia.

The signatories point out that "the Latin American footwear industry is strictly complying with the preventive isolation established by the authorities of each of the countries" and as such "manufacture, distribution and commercialization of footwear are completely paralyzed”. This paralysation of the manufacturing and retail activities has led to deep difficulties in the footwear sector, and the local sectorial associations fear that a flow of imports from Asia might intensify the problems.

In this sense, the associations ask for the development of transitional measures coordinated at regional level, such as the application of safeguards, dumping and all those necessities that will “allow the mitigation of  the difficult moment that we will face”.

The footwear industry in those countries is also proposing the implementation of health protocols to help the gradual return to activity with the necessary health requirements to preserve the health of all workers and entrepreneurs while developing trade protocols for the footwear activity.