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The latest report from Textile Exchange is upbeat about the ‘preferred’ textile fibres such as identity cottons, recycled polyester and bio-based synthetics.The report names Nike, Puma, H&M, G-Star Raw and prAna as the biggest users of recycled polyester.
The growing popularity of identity cottons produced in compliance with voluntary sustainable standards, upward projections for recycled polyester manufacture by leading resin suppliers, and projected growth in Tencel production by Lenzing at its new Austrian plant are key reasons to be optimistic about the sustainable textile fibre market, suggests the report by Textile Exchange (TE).
The report, ‘Preferred Fibres Market Summary’, is fibres based on global market size, Textile Exchange’s Material Snapshots and the values set by the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC), Higg Index, MSI and the Made-By Environmental Benchmark for Fibres have been selected. The report includes competition with other crops for agricultural land, rising raw materials prices for recycled synthetics, and a lack of performing substitutes for spandex which is blended with a wide variety of textile fibres.
This latest TE report provides a useful overview of different types of recycled polyester and bio-based synthetics as well as a helpful side-by-side comparison of the similarities and differences between various cotton sustainability initiatives and standards.
Textileexchange.org
Polluting textile factories in Bangladesh could be hit with a new green tax.The new levy will be imposed on a company that wantonly pollutes the country’s rivers with untreated effluents. The fine would be in the form of a one per cent environment protection surcharge or green tax on an ad-valorem basis.
At present, factories breaching pollution standards may face a one-off fine but bribery of inspection officials is not uncommon. The industry is being encouraged to set up effluent treatment plants. Industrial effluents and waste from urban sewage are seen as severely contaminating rivers and taking a heavy toll on the aquatic environment and its surroundings.
However, it’s not only about fines. Newly competing low cost textile sourcing destinations such as Ethiopia and Myanmar together with a shift towards re-shoring represent a significant threat to Bangladesh’s ready-made garment industries.
In view of this, and with the aim of making the industry competitive, the government is mulling tax inducements to key sectors such as garment manufacture which have been beset by problems in recent times, particularly in the wake of last year’s Rana Plaza factory disaster which killed more than 1,000 people.
Many Chinese and Hong Kong textile and garment firms operating in Vietnam have plans to expand their business and investments in the country. Vietnam saw a sharp increase in foreign direct investment from Hong Kong and China in the first five months of this year.
Hong Kong was ranked the second largest foreign investor in Vietnam between January and May with around four times its investment during the same period last year. China was ranked the seventh largest foreign investor in the January to May period with a three-fold year-on-year increase.
FDI in the textile and garment industry of Vietnam has increased since mid-2012 with large-scale projects invested by businesses from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Among the projects are a textile and dyeing plant from a Hong Kong company which will occupy 20 hectares and manufacture 3,00,000 tons of fiber and dye 20,000 tons of cotton annually.
Chinese investors are boosting investment in Vietnam because they want tariff-free access to the United States, the largest textile and garment export market for Vietnam, once the two countries join the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Apart from textiles and garments, Chinese and Hong Kong investors have also boosted their investment in real estate in Vietnam.
Coats has launched Hemseal, a new product delivering additional fixing qualities to the hems of tailored garments. The adhesive thread has a low melt portion which adheres to fabrics when pressed under heat, helping to hold hems in place even if the stitching fails.
Coats is the world’s leading industrial thread and consumer textile crafts business. Blind stitching hems of garments produces a neat, unobtrusive hem line but, because it is a chain stitch using a single thread, it can easily unravel and cause the hem to drop down. Hemseal is used as a part of the hem construction and can also be reactivated by repressing.
The advantage of Hemseal is that the hem remains in place even if the blind stitch used to sew it unravels. This helps enhance the durability of the garment and will reduce those annoying instant hem drops that can happen in clothing like tailored suits and school uniforms.
Hemseal can be used on most types of fabrics – including heavier ones requiring additional seam adhesion where it can be incorporated in the overlock stitching. Coats is the second largest and fastest growing global zip manufacturer. One in five garments on the planet is held together using Coats’ thread. Coats produces enough yarn to knit 70 million scarves a year.
A new activator developed by Chinese researchers for hydrogen peroxide used to bleach cotton fabrics halves the amount of energy needed for the process. Traditional cotton bleaching techniques used in industry require temperatures in excess of 98°C and high alkalinity to produce the desired whiteness. The process uses large amounts of energy, degrades the cotton fabric so it loses weight and thickness and produces waste water with a high chemical oxygen component.
The team used a spectrophotometer to measure the whiteness index of the cotton treated with its method and found that it was comparable to that of cotton bleached using the traditional method. The cotton loses less weight during the new process, and retains some of its natural waxes, resulting in a softer fabric. The fabric can be dyed to virtually the same color depth as fabric bleached traditionally. The process not only uses less energy, but saves time in water heating, and uses less water, as the traditional process has an extra cooling step.
The only downside of the process is that more hydrogen peroxide is needed than in traditional methods to ensure the same rate of oxidative reactions at the lower temperature. However, this does not significantly affect the strength of the fabric.
Pakistan's exports of readymade garments increased by 9.36 per cent for the first time in Q3 of this year as compared to the same period last year. The readymade garment industry has emerged an important small scale industry as its products have a large demand both at home and abroad.
The local requirements of readymade garments are almost met by this industry. The garment industry is also a good source of employment to a large number of people at a low capital investment. The industry mainly uses locally produced raw materials. Most of the manufacturing machines used by this industry are imported or locally made and assembled.
Production of garments depends on export orders. These orders have somewhat risen in terms of value, but have been fluctuating widely in terms of quantity. One problem is that while the European Union has opened up its markets to duty-free imports from Pakistan, the country’s garment industry is not really able to grab the opportunity. Garment manufacturers claim the government’s restrictive import policies are blocking access to new raw materials, which they require to diversify their product lines to take full advantage of the duty-free access.
Americhem will lead a technical seminar on color and performance additives for specialty fibers at ITMA Asia + CITME from June 16 to June 20 in Shanghai, China. Americhem is a leading provider of custom color and additive solutions for synthetic fibers. It will demonstrate more light stable pigments for outdoor use. These products are also excellent for automotive upholstery, including colors that easily hide yellowing of recycled PET. There will also be a discussion of additives that enhance product performance, including flame retardants, antimicrobials and UV stabilisers.
Americhem will also display custom colors and additives designed for use in many high-performance textile applications. While promoting the company’s theme of ‘Living a Green & Colorful Life’, Americhem will display solution-dyed products in three key categories: awnings and outdoor fabrics, automotive fabrics and high performance apparel.
Americhem manufactures custom color and additive solutions for polymeric products. The company’s products include custom color and additive master batches, single pigment dispersion, high-performance blacks and whites, and custom compounding solutions. It serves nonwovens, turf, textiles, and carpet synthetic fiber markets and building products, transportation, packaging and containers, engineered materials, film and sheet, and other specialties markets. The company was founded in 1941 and is based in Ohio.
People need no longer worry about soaking wet trunks after emerging from a swim. A Toronto-based entrepreneur has come up with a range of swim trunks made from hydrophobic material -- a fabric that repels water. It looks like ordinary swimwear from the outside, but when it is covered in liquid, the garment instantly repels water.
It’s a polyester-blend hydrophobic nanomaterial technology. The technology is thought to work by bonding billions of nanoparticles to individual fibers on a microscopic level. When water-based liquids hit the surface of this material they form a 150-degree sphere and roll off. This fabric has proven to drastically reduce dry-times by up to 95 per cent in contrast to regular 100 per cent polyester swim shorts.
Similarly a student has invented a T-shirt that is impossible to stain. The top can resist any spills and splashes including Coca-Cola, tomato ketchup, mustard, milkshakes, beer, ink and even red wine. The clothing is made from polyester, which has been infused with a combination of chemicals that makes it resistant to water.
The fabric is layered with billions of silica particles. Water-based liquids will form a 150 degree sphere and roll right off. Most liquid molecules will not be able to touch the fabric because of a microscopic layer of air that forms between the liquid and the fabric.
The 13th edition of Maredimoda will be held from November 11 to 13 in Cannes. This is an international trade fair dedicated to lingerie and beachwear textiles and accessories. Nearly 100 exhibitors, representing the highest quality standards of Made in Europe in terms of creativity, research, quality and reliability would be in attendance.
Maredimoda acts as a bridge between the world of semi-finished products and garment-making and the world of outsourcing. By connecting the two worlds it offers retailers a top-class supply chain that represents a quality trademark.
Maredimoda is the top event for beachwear and lingerie fabrics and accessories boasting the presence of international exhibitors and visitors whose numbers continue to grow year after year. As a result, it is a key event for professionals in terms of contacts, exchanges and business, old and new. The event stresses on European quality and excellence. It focuses on traceability in the production chain, consumer protection, European creativity promotion and defense of the European textile culture.
The 2016 summer collections by most qualified European companies will be playing a starring role and will be supported by a delegation of fast-fashion garment makers from the Euro-Mediterranean area.
Apparel giant Gap has become the first leading US retailer to source garments produced in Myanmar. Myanmar now expects more international investments to follow. The San Francisco-based company placed an order earlier this year for jackets and vests to be made at two factories in Yangon, for its Old Navy and Banana Republic Factory brands. The range will be shipped to the United States in June and available for sale in stores later this summer.
After consulting with US Customs and conducting two focus groups, the garments manufactured in Yangon region will carry ‘Made in Myanmar (Burma)’ tags. Though the American company has not directly invested in Myanmar, it will source from factories owned by a South Korean company. The company is keen to pursue its sourcing needs as the manufacturing industry in Myanmar matures.
Gap is the first high-profile entry into Myanmar’s garment industry since reforms under taken by President U Thein Sein encouraged the US and the EU to ease sanctions. Through the 1990s and early 2000s the garment industry was one of the Myanmar’s fastest-growing sectors and one of the major employment generation industries. From 1990 to 2001 garment exports grew 69-fold and by 2000 accounted for 39.5 per cent of Myanmar’s total exports, up from just 2.5pc a decade earlier.
In 2013 export revenues hit nearly $1 billion, according to the Myanmar Garment Manufacturers Association (MGMA), the industry’s largest trade organisation and employment in the industry has jumped from 80,000 people to 250,000 over the past three to four years. The number of garment factories has also grown to more than 200, up from 181 in November 2012, according to MGMA numbers. The group has forecast that exports for the 2013-14 fiscal year could hit 1.5 billion dollars.
