FW
For the first quarter of 2018, Itema’s turnover grew 15 per cent. The group has a strong international presence with 92 per cent of the total resulting from foreign markets. The Italian market achieved good results as well. Itema’s weaving machines are the preferred choice of weavers in the main textile markets such as China, Turkey and India.
In 2017, the group launched a diversification strategy, Project Galaxy that led to its acquisition of a majority interest in Lamiflex, a leading supplier of technical composite products for the textile, aeronautical and medical industries. Itema will face the rest of the year relying on the momentum and confidence ensured by a well-filled order book for the upcoming months.
The group invests three per cent of its turnover every year in research and innovation. Tireless and steady commitment to continuous innovation has led Itema to develop breakthrough and smart weaving solutions. Itema’s new R95002 denim rapier weaving machine, a second generation weaving machine, has been specifically designed and developed to excel in denim weaving and features numerous advancements.
The I Saver is a breakthrough innovation which can completely eliminate the waste selvedge on the fabric left side leading to substantial savings for denim weavers.
India’s production volumes of textiles are significantly lower than in May 2016. Textiles manufacturing declined 0.5 per cent and apparels by 12.8 per cent. This decline was over and above the 3.2 and 6 per cent dip in May 2017, when total production declined 4.9 per cent. This only shows that the decline has accelerated instead of rebounding. In May 2018, the two components together declined 8.9 per cent year on year.
A recovery can only happen if investment climate improves and income grows. Overall employment generation needs to be accelerated quickly to revive the textile industry. In fact, India’s textile and clothing sector is witnessing signs of recovery and expected to perform better in export and domestic markets this year.
The sector saw a major hit due to demonetisation, implementation of GST, rupee appreciation, and high domestic cotton prices. India is now poised to overtake China in the textile sector by capitalizing on factors such as cheaper labor and modernization. With quality and skilled labor and machinery, India can easily overcome Chinese competition in the textile industry as labor costs in China are very high compared to India’s.
India aims to double the annual revenue of the textile industry in the country by 2025.
Indian denim mills are exploring Vietnam. KG Fabriks from Coimbatore has been putting efforts into this market for the last four years and has succeeded in getting some volume business and new customers. As of now, the company is working with some eight or 10 clients and expecting 30 to 40 per cent growth in orders from Vietnam, the company as of now is managing its logistics well, as most of the demand it gets is for regular products.
KG Fabriks uses only three liters of water to produce one meter of denim fabric. Use of sulphur rather than reactives is another attraction of the company’s products.
Surat’s Anubha Industries has been pushing its offerings for the last three years and is now geared up for good business. The company is in the process of opening an office in Vietnam. Anubha is continuously meeting with new buying houses, brands, and jeans manufacturers in Vietnam and exchanging ideas in product requirement and offerings.
Aarvee Denims and Exports from Ahmedabad has been exploring this market with comparatively limited focus but is now geared up with full preparations. Vietnam, the world’s third largest apparel exporting country, is a growing opportunity for Indian denim mills.
Greenpeace has praised Inditex, Benetton and H&M for leading the industry towards a toxic-free future” in its third Detox Catwalk campaign to eliminate hazardous chemicals by 2020. The three apparel firms topped the online ranking of 19 fashion and sportswear companies, with Greenpeace stating that they were the only avant-garde companies that were on track to clean up their chains as promised by 2020, due to them all having “credible timelines, concrete actions and on-the-ground implementation” in place.
Greenpeace says the global partnership with WWF work with other brands within the Swedish Textile Water Initiative (STWI), which aims to improve industry standards on water and chemical management and energy use, are some examples of that.
The other 12 brands, including Adidas, Burberry, Levi’s, Primark and Puma, have found themselves in the middle evolution mode, as they all have made commitments to detox and Greenpeace can see that progress to implement plans has been made, however, they believe that they need to “evolve faster” to achieve the 2020 Detox goal.
With Greenpeace adding that each brand is not banning enough hazardous chemicals and rely on flawed chemical list from the industry group Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC). This list is missing important substances like PFCs and solvents like Dimethylformamide (DMF).
American and European companies are setting up shop in Ethiopia. Until now, the majority of FDI was coming from China. Power supply and labor in Ethiopia is reliable and cheaper so it creates an attractive alternative to more commonly known manufacturing destinations. Industrial parks up and down the country are employing thousands of people. The country now has business stakes in all major sea ports in east Africa and the state-owned Ethiopian Airlines freights cargo to over 40 international destinations.
Velocity Apparelz from Dubai does textile production in Ethiopia. The factory can produce 26,300 pieces of jeans, 200 kg of knitted garments, a lakh pieces of poly-bag and 60,000 cartons a year. The workspace is automated, set up on conveyor systems, powered by wind and lit by LED bulbs with its own water treatment on-site. Other sustainable practices at the factory include waterless washing, sublimation fabric printing and laser-blast technology.
American Philip Van Heusen established a joint venture in Ethiopia in 2016 with Indian manufacturer Arvind. The PVH Arvind conglomerate will export eight million shirts annually. Over 80,000 Ethiopian people work in the textile sector and the plan is to make that two million by 2025.
Shoppers in China are encouraged to buy items that will contribute to sustainable lifestyles. Waste and pollution associated with the textile and clothing industries is a growing issue, especially in China.
In 2014, China had begun to exceed the global average consumption of new clothes, which was five kg per person. Chinese shoppers bought 6.5 kg each that year. About half of Chinese consumers buy more than they can afford. About 40 per cent make compulsive purchases more than once a week, with young, high income women being the most vulnerable.
Fashion giants have introduced clothing recycling programs. They are transparent about their textile manufacturing process, or have released clothing collections that have rebranded sustainable consumption as fashionable.
H&M, for example, has collected more than 61,000 tons of garments globally since its clothing recycling program launched in 2013. More than 2,200 tons of the clothing collected was in China. Denim backpacks are being produced from used jeans. Shopping malls have started placing clothing collection boxes. Shops sell products made from organic materials that can be reused, like cotton bags.
However, shopping habits die hard and do make eco-friendly fashion a tough sell. For instance potential customers, wary of used clothing, need convincing that items have been thoroughly disinfected.
US punitive tariffs will hit around 50 per cent of total Chinese exports to the US. Even though China will suffer some offset in export competitiveness, the significant depreciation of Chinese yuan against the dollar will provide an offset. The United States will begin the process of imposing 10 per cent tariffs on an additional 200 billion dollars of Chinese imports. The action is in response to China’s decision to impose retaliatory tariffs of $34 billion of US imports.
The Chinese export sector would be hit hard by the additional tariffs, particularly key industries such as textiles, metal products, auto parts, glass products and electrical and electronic equipment. The new US list of products subject to an additional ten per cent duty will impact a large range of Chinese textile products, including cotton and wool fabrics and yarns.
The US feels that its large bilateral merchandise trade deficit with China will help since China will run out of US products to impose retaliatory tariffs on long before the US runs out of Chinese products to apply punitive tariffs on. The US is China’s largest export market, accounting for 19 per cent of overall shipments. The wider damage of the US-China trade war will significantly increase the transmission effects to the rest of the Asia Pacific economies.
As an apparel manufacturer, Wrangler wants to improve the environmental performance of its products. To that end, Wrangler is collaborating with MyFarms, a platform built by farmers for farmers to make their jobs easier and more profitable.
Last year, Wrangler joined Field to Market: The Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture, a multi-stakeholder initiative working to increase supply chain sustainability around natural resources. Members’ combined revenues total more than 1.5 trillion dollars.
Wrangler purchases roughly half of the cotton for its products from US growers. The pilot program builds on the company’s long-standing commitment to supporting US farming communities and other programs including a commitment to 100 per cent renewable electricity by 2025, zero waste facilities and manufacturing and technology improvements that have saved three billion liters of water over the last decade.
Sustainable cotton farming techniques improve crop yields and reduce costs while slashing greenhouse gas emissions. Field-level sustainability data can strengthen business relationships and results throughout agricultural supply chains.
Sustainable practices help justify a price premium for cotton growers. Even though the growers might only receive a few extra pennies at the point of sale, that premium can significantly increase farm income. For Wrangler, sustainable farming is helping drive a more sustainable supply chain for its denim.
India’s knitwear exports have been falling month on month since October 2017. For the second half of 2017-18 the decline in exports was 21 per cent. And the negative trend in export growth is continuing this fiscal.
The sector went through a challenging business environment following the implementation of GST. But now yarn prices threaten to derail the industry. This would affect the sector and also have a boomerang effect on textile mills.
Cotton yarn prices have increased by Rs 20 a kg. The impact of price increase has made textile mills increase yarn prices which ultimately affects downstream value added sectors like weaving, knitting, garmenting and made ups, particularly value added exporters, as they can not hike the price which was fixed more than three to five months back.
However, a turnaround seems as the sector is now booking orders and business has started to look up and is poised to bring back the industry from the brink after a prolonged one year lull.
Knitwear exporters want the Cotton Corporation of India to ensure the availability of enough supplies of the desired quality to protect the interests of farmers, the textile industry and also to generate employment.
While hailing the increase in MSP for cotton, the Southern India Mills’ Association (SIMA) has emphasised on the need for Price Stabilisation Fund (PSF) scheme and a Technology Mission on Cotton (TMC) in a revised format to double the income of the cotton farmers and to grow the business of the industry as well.
Cotton PSF scheme consisting of 5 to 7 per cent interest subvention, 10 per cent margin money and nine months credit limit would enable spinning mills and the Cotton Corporation of India to compete with multinational cotton traders and cover cotton during peak season.
PSF would also bring more GST revenue and boost exports. To roll out TMC (between 1999 and 2002) and introduction of Bt cotton, India emerged the largest producer of cotton. Following the government’s withdrawal of extension of TMC, farmers’ suffering began with spurious seeds, lack of seed technology and technology transfer, agronomy research, quality deterioration of the fibre at ginning stage and so on.
The Southern India Mills’ Association (SIMA) has emphasised the need for Price Stabilisation Fund (PSF) scheme and a Technology Mission on Cotton (TMC) in a revised format to double the income of cotton farmers and to grow the business of the industry as well.
The textile industry, which is predominantly MSME in nature could not compete with the multinational traders in covering cotton requirement. They thus were forced to shell out 10 to 25 per cent higher cost for home grown cotton during off-season.
