Rising demand and buyers’ confidence coupled with enhanced capacity and duty benefits helped the country’s readymade garment (RMG) sector to more than double its exports in the last six years, according to a recent report. This has been possible due to the government’s policy support, availability of gas and land at reasonable price, good industrial relations and product and market diversification efforts to the gradual increase in export earnings. The country fetched $28.09 billion from RMG (knit and woven) exports in FY 2015-16, which was $12.49 billion in 2009-10, according to the data. Its contribution to the total foreign currency earnings also increased to 82.04 per cent in the last fiscal, which was nearly 77 per cent six years back. Out of the $28.09 billion, the knitwear sector fetched $13.35 billion, while $14.73 billion came from exports of woven items in the last fiscal. In 2009-10 fiscal, export earnings from knitwear and woven were $6.48 billion and $6.01 billion respectively. The main cause behind such phenomenal leap in its exports is because of EU changing the rules of origin. Despite a weakening euro, shipment, especially of woven items to the markets of the 27-nation European Union (EU), is on the rise after the EU relaxed its rules of origin. During the last ten years, Bangladesh got duty free access in many countries including Canada, Japan, China, India and Australia while the EU’s revised rules of origin gave a big boost to woven exports to that region. There was, in fact, no comprehensive plan for the industry. But the policy support from the government including available gas connection and incentive to explore new markets also supported the sector to grow and flourish. Bangladesh has also enriched its capacity in washing, dying, sequence, embroidery, print and variation in fabric that also helped adding more value. Prices of woven items especially those of denim ones are on the rise. Denim is an item used by both men and women all the year round and rising cost in China has created an opportunity for Bangladesh to grab the market. Local woven and knitwear makers are now diversifying their product basket mainly to enhance their competitiveness for the sake of greater sustainability on the global market. Suit, sportswear, work wear, nightwear, socks and lingerie are among the products that have emerged strongly in recent years. Going beyond the traditional notion of being low-cost and mass production, some of the companies are increasingly moving towards more value-added products. Some have already invested in product variations. It may be mentioned here Bangladesh is the second largest apparel exporter in the world, after China. The market share of Bangladesh, in the $503 billion global garment items is 5.1 per cent, according to data from the International Trade Statistics of the World Bank in 2014. China’s market share is 38.6 per cent and Vietnam and India share 3.7 per cent. However, China has been losing its market share mainly due to higher cost of production. Following such shift, Bangladesh’s export of garment items is on the rise as the global apparel retail giants are also increasing the volume of work orders for quality garment at competitive prices. However, working condition for the labourers, including the issue of workplace safety, has always been a major concern for the international buyers. The issue especially came into forefront following the Rana Plaza collapse in April 2013. Now the issue has largely been resolved. In fact, imposing any trade restriction cannot solve any problem. Rather coordinated and coherent investment in workplace safety by the international apparel giants can offer a better solution in improving the working condition of the country’s garment factories. Bangladesh will benefit in the battle for capacities that is on the horizon. Hitherto, local exporters have focused on growth based on their two most important advantages — price and capacity. They remained content being providers of satisfactory quality levels especially in value and entry level mid-market products. Overall though, they still lag in acceptable speed to market, compliance standards and a professional management pool. Availability of large pool of cheap labour and entrepreneurial spirits of Bangladeshi businessmen are two main components of providing large capacity and price competitive offerings to international sourcing market. There is no denying that the country is facing many hurdles in growing its garments industry. Unfortunately, many of them are peculiar to global standards. On the other hand, it has evolved to be extremely resilient to peculiarities such as long-term political violence, shutdown of transport network and businesses creating havoc in the entire supply chain. There were uncertainties after the tragic Rana Plaza disaster. No one knew how the international buyers would respond. Gloomy predictions of large scale exodus of orders to alternative sourcing markets were made by many pundits and industry players. Bangladesh’s poor workplace safety was the only news coming out of Bangladesh. However, the country survived the onslaught on the tragic incident. After the obvious dip in export post-Rana Plaza, the export rebounded to its normal growth trajectory. The Bangladesh garment exporters reported that orders from “compliant” factories are rising by 15-20 per cent. There is now significant focus on factory safety conditions, including structural integrity and fire safety protections than ever before in the past. It seems Bangladesh is set to make the best of a bad situation. Needless to say, it will require the continued investment in the sector both by the entrepreneurs of large and medium exporters as well as the financial sector. Creation of enabling infrastructural facilities will be an absolute necessity. Recent study found that more investments will improve Bangladesh’s vital RMG sector, ensuring the industry to be well placed to compete globally. However, there should be some strategies to be taken up to woo more investment in the sector. Ensuring that companies comply with safety regulations is important not only for worker’s safety but also to increase opportunities to export. Better compliance across the RMG industry would require initial investments to improve physical infrastructure and fire protection, as well as funding for operations costs to maintain high levels of compliance from year-to-year.
