"That position is unchangeable. It's a deal that's already been done, it can't be undone," Cheidu Osakwe, director of the World Trade Organisation's textile division, said in a speech to trade policy specialists.

The US textile industry, fearing a flood of cheap Chinese imports when the quotas expire at the end of this year, has been leading an international effort to persuade the WTO to approve a three-year extension of the quota system.

However, Osakwe said that WTO members recognise that extending the quotas would unravel a key portion of the 1994 Uruguay Round world trade agreement, which required countries to make difficult trade concessions in a number of sectors.

"I strongly believe there will be no government that will table a proposal for an extension" of the quotas, he said.

Jennifer Hillman, vice chairman of the US International Trade Commission, said a recent study done by the trade panel showed world textile production making a very large shift into China when the quotas end.

Hillman, who emphasised she was not speaking as a representative of the US government or the ITC, said that importers expect to source supplies from a very small number of countries when the quotas end versus the dozens they buy from currently.