Local garment manufacturers have set a target to raise Bangladesh’s share in the global apparel market to 10 per cent by 2025 from below 7 per cent now by adding new products and entering new markets.
By 2022, they want to lift the market share to 8 per cent from 6.8 per cent presently.
“Political stability is important for us to achieve the target,” said Faruque Hassan, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), while disclosing the targets at a press conference at the BGMEA office at Uttara in Dhaka yesterday.
The World Trade Organisation is scheduled to announce the global market share data this month.
The global apparel market is expected to reach $842 billion in 2025 and $1,138 billion in 2030.
Despite heightened global uncertainty amid the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war and runaway inflation, local garment exporters are bullish as work orders are shifting from China to Bangladesh largely because of the lingering trade tension between the two largest economies in the world and a dearth of workers in the Chinese apparel sector.
The Asian markets such as India and Japan will be major focus for the BGMEA as it looks to capture the 10 per cent stake and earn $100 billion through apparel exports by 2030.
Shipment to Japan has already surpassed the $1-billion mark. It rose 16.27 per cent to $1.09 billion in the fiscal year that ended in June.
The export to India surged 69.58 per cent to $715.41 million and to South Korea by 36.43 per cent to $439.75 million, data from the Export Promotion Bureau showed.
“We are expecting a higher garment shipment growth in India and Japan in the near future,” said Hassan.
Asia’s apparel market is projected to be $613 billion in 2022.
He also suggested the government accept India’s free transit offer that was extended last week during the meeting in New Delhi between Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.
He cited that when there was long congestion at the Chattogram port last year, many exporters had to ship goods through the Kolkata airport to maintain the lead time.
A good quantity of items is shipped to European countries through the Colombo seaport.
Local manufacturers are also expanding their capacity to man-made fibres (MMF) along with cotton fibre to receive higher prices from international retailers and brands.
This is because if the price of a cotton-made T-shirt is $5, the same apparel item produced from MMF would bring $10.
Of the garment items shipped from Bangladesh, 74 per cent is made from cotton fibre and the rest from MMF.
By contrast, MMF accounts for 78 per cent of garments sold globally, and only 22 per cent is made from cotton fibre.
Bangladesh is also eying a big pie of the $224 billion global technical textile markets, which include products like personal protection equipment, hospital bed sheets, and uniforms of nurses.
Hassan said they have got better prices recently because of the price adjustment by the buyers in line with a spike in freight charges and industrial raw material costs.
He predicted a 20 per cent to 30 per cent fall in garment shipment between September and November because of the dragging war and record inflation in Europe.
Inflation in the eurozone, home to more than 60 per cent of garment items exported from Bangladesh, surged 9.1 per cent in August, the ninth straight month of spikes.
“But such a situation is temporary,” Hassan said, adding that retailers and brands are also sitting on unsold stocks of garment items as consumers have tightened belts amid higher cost of living.
“In some cases, international retailers and buyers are putting orders on hold because of a slowdown in demand in Europe.”
The BGMEA chief is expecting at least 15 per cent year-on-year growth in export receipts in the current fiscal year.
Garment shipment clocked 35.47 per cent year-on-year growth in the fiscal year of 2021-22, bringing home $42.61 billion.
Currently, Bangladesh is the global champion in green garment factories: the country has 170 Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) factories certified by the United States Green Building Council. Of them, 52 are platinum-rated and 104 gold-rated.
The LEED certification and strengthening of workplace safety in keeping with the recommendations of two foreign inspection agencies — Accord and Alliance – have also brightened the image of the sector and the country, according to Hassan.
At the press conference, he also announced the mega event ‘Made in Bangladesh Week’, which will be held at the Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka between November 12 and 18 to exhibit the country’s strong performance in the garment sector.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is scheduled to inaugurate the event.
Nearly a dozen of events such as the Dhaka Apparel Expo, the Bangladesh Denim Expo, and the Dhaka Apparel Summit will take place during the week, while the BGMEA Innovation Centre would be launched.
