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The textile minister has given the go-ahead to supersede the Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) and appoint a government administrator to take over its management. As per the textile secretary Rashmi Verma’s letter to corporate affairs secretary Tapan Ray keeping in view the large scale fraud of government grants by the Council, it has been decided that the government may appoint an ‘Administrator’ to takeover the management of the Council so that its functioning may be streamlined to protect public interest.
Verma requested Ray to examine the possibility of appointing a ‘government administrator’, superseding the existing executive body of the Council as provided in Section 397 to 400 of the Companies Act. Under the Act, a Section 8 company such as AEPC can be ‘superseded’ and a government administrator be appointed only through the Company Law Tribunal under the Ministry of Corporate Affairs.
According to sources, the Textiles Ministry had received a plethora of complaints against AEPC on issues of corporate governance, mismanagement of funds, misuse of Apparel International Mart and illegal leasing of office space in Delhi to benefit a private firm. While taking cognizance of the transgressions, the ministry started issuing ‘corrective actions’ since June 2015. Reminders were sent but ‘AEPC, despite clear directions from the Ministry under Article 101 (i) has shown disobedience and not willing to improve its corporate governance,’ wrote Verma.
"Textile and apparel manufacturing in the USA is enjoying resurgence. And making the most of this even companies based in India and China are investing in US facilities, says a recent Textiles Intelligence report. Reshoaring as its known may have been triggered partly due to concerns over factory safety and growing concerns over the safety of chemicals and a lack of traceability. Equally, retailers and brands are being taken to task over environmental sustainability."
Textile and apparel manufacturing in the USA is enjoying resurgence. And making the most of this even companies based in India and China are investing in US facilities, says a recent Textiles Intelligence report. Reshoaring as its known may have been triggered partly due to concerns over factory safety and growing concerns over the safety of chemicals and a lack of traceability. Equally, retailers and brands are being taken to task over environmental sustainability. All of these are easier to monitor and control in US factories than they are in far-off developing countries.
Competitive advantage
Similarly, developments in technology, notably automation and robotics are enabling US factories to cut costs while proximity to the market provides producers in the US with a significant competitive advantage over companies based in distant countries in terms of quick response and market knowledge.
Reshoring would appear to have the support of the public. Almost eight out of 10 US consumers say they would rather buy an American-made product than an imported one. And over 60 per cent of them would be willing to pay 10 per cent more for it.
The resurgence in manufacturing in the USA has been however, fairly modest and followed substantial losses between 2005 and 2008. Indeed, the US apparel industry still supplies less than 3 per cent of the US domestic market for apparel in volume terms. Also, US apparel imports continue to be dominated by low cost Asian suppliers, reflecting the fact that cost minimisation continues to play a vital role in sourcing decisions.
Desperate shortage of skilled operatives in the US is one of the biggest obstacles to reshoring. Moreover, there are not enough people who can do the training. Most of these people retired long ago without being replaced by younger entrants. There is also a lack of skilled technicians who are able to maintain sewing machinery.
Role of migrants
Meanwhile, migrants are playing an important role in the reshoring of textiles and clothing to fill the gap. In general, migrants have a younger age profile than that of the US population as a whole and, if motivated properly, they are likely to work harder and more energetically than their older counterparts. Besides, economic migrants are, by definition, motivated by the potential for increasing their standard of living and are therefore willing to put in the hours and effort required to achieve this. Above all, many migrants bring with them the sewing skills they acquired in their countries of origin, particularly those migrants who originate in Mexico or other Latin American countries.
However, the availability of migrants as a human resource is likely to be limited by public opinion. The subject of migration raises temperatures in most host countries, and there is evidence that the tide is very much against migration on a significant scale.
Bangladesh’s export earnings have fallen 3.5 per cent to $2.53 billion due to negative growth of clothing sector in the first month of current fiscal year compared to the same period a year ago. According to the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) provisional data in July 2016, Bangladesh fetched $2.53 billion, which is 3.49 per cent less compared to $2.62 billion in July 2015. The figure is nearly 25 per cent less than that of the target of $3.37 billion set for the month of July 2016.
Meanwhile, trade analysts and manufacturers as well as the government have attributed Eid vacation to the downtrend of export earnings. They argued that the factories, especially the RMGs, were closed due to the vacation, which caused less production. There is no connection between the current situation and the work orders executed in July, which were placed two to three months ago, said Khondaker Golam Moazzem, additional research director of the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD).
Similarly, the country’s RMG export earnings witnessed a 4.41 per cent decline to $2.11 billion in July, which was $2.22 billion in the same period a year ago. The figure is 23.60 per cent less than the target of $3.03 billion set for the month of July 16.
Most global brands doing business in Bangladesh have decided not to move away from the country. They will continue to buy products from Bangladesh’s garment sector despite serial attacks on the foreigners by the Islamist extremists.
Despite the terror strike at a Dhaka restaurant that raised eyebrows of many US-based fashion brands, the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety has declared that most of the US companies have decided to stay in Bangladesh and purchase products from Bangladesh’s garment industry.
Meanwhile, along with other friendly countries, US has also expressed serious concern over the security conditions in Bangladesh and offered help in country’s fight against terrorism. People of Bangladesh have been witnessing serial attacks on religious minorities, foreign nationals and independent bloggers from the last couple of years, but the Dhaka café attack was the biggest among them that caught global attention since many foreigners including Japanese, Italian and Indian nationals were killed in the attack.
In order to help Bangladesh in its fight against growing extremism, the United States has agreed to work together. Bangladesh’s Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu has recently made it clear that like Bangladesh, the US is also worried about the security situation in the country. He added that the US has expressed willingness to work with the government of Bangladesh to address issues like cyber crime and militancy.
China’s Zhejiang Export Fair 2016 was held at the International Exhibition Centre in Hanoi from August 4-6. Inaugurating the fair, Feng Wei, Director, Economic-Commerce Desk under China's Zhejiang Commerce Department said the Zhejiang Export Fair would serve as an important bridge to boost China-Vietnam bilateral trade ties. He said to further enhance reciprocal cooperation with ASEAN countries, including Vietnam, his department carried out a project to promote Zhejiang-made products to the world.
Under the project and with the support of Vietnam's Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), the fifth Zhejiang Export Fair could draw participation of 114 Zhejiang companies. Zhejiang is a coastal province located in the Southeast of China with ideal natural conditions. It posted rapid economic growth in recent years and boasts of economic relations with over 230 countries and territories around the world. In 2015, the province’s total export turnover reached $347.4 billion.
For China, Vietnam continued to be the largest trading partner with total import-export revenue of more than $66.6 billion in 2015, up 13.4 per cent year-on-year. For Vietnam too China is the largest trading partner among ASEAN countries. With the intention of promoting the attractive feeling of Zhejiang Made products to Vietnam and Southeast Asia, the fair drew a great deal of attention from local companies and consumers.
VF Corporation has appointed Jim Pisani as its Global Brand President for Timberland®, with immediate effect. Pisani replaces Stewart Whitney who left the company in July 2016. Most recently, Pisani served as President of VF’s licensed sports group that includes the Majestic® brand. He will report to Scott Baxter, Vice President, VF and Group President, Outdoor & Action Sports Americas.
Pisani joined VF in 2008 as President of VF Licensed Sports Group. The business unit’s Majestic® brand is the official on-field uniform provider for Major League Baseball. It also supplies apparel and fan wear through licensing agreements with U.S. and international professional sports leagues, colleges and universities, and lifestyle brands.
Prior to VF, Pisani held a succession of leadership roles in branding, merchandising, sales and marketing at PepsiCo and Kraft Foods.
For Indonesian textile giant Sri Rejeki Isman (Sritex), the security concerns in Europe caused by a series of terrorist attacks and an influx of refugees from war-torn Middle Eastern countries has presented an opportunity to expand its military uniform business, under the brands Sritex and SRX. The company is intensifying its approach to affected countries, in the hope of tapping into the spillover from their defense budgets.
Sritex corporate secretary Welly Salam says, they are eyeing three countries in Europe, some former Soviet Union countries, to export military and fashion items. Sritex, exports military uniforms to 30 countries and aims to increase export proportion gradually from 49 to 60 per cent by 2018. Among its biggest overseas customers are Germany, Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates.
Apart from efforts to open up new markets, Sritex, has also been developing an additional production facility at $245 million to boost its annual production since 2014. The new facility, located in the Central Java city of Sukoharjo, will support its existing factory, which currently runs at a 90 per cent utility rate and employs almost 18,000 workers. Once completed by this year-end, the new plant will add to the total capacity of Sritex’ annual production by 16 per cent to 654,0000 bales of thread; weaving 50 per cent more to 120 million meters of greige fabric, dying 100 per cent more to 240 million yards of fabric and tailoring 67 per cent more to 30 million pieces of attire.
The half-century-old firm buys raw material, like cotton, 100 per cent from Australia and the US, 50 per cent of its polyester comes locally and 50 per cent of its rayon locally as producers of the two materials are also limited in the country.
Mimaki Engineering, is a global industry leader and manufacturer of wide-format inkjet printers, cutting plotters, 3D modeling machines and RIP software. The company adds value to the print production process with innovative software solutions that drive accurate, brilliant colour, attracting attention in an ever-more-colourful world.
Three new software solutions highlight this innovative approach. They are the Artista Textile Color Collection, Mimaki Profile Master 3 (MPM3) for advanced printer profiling and RasterLink6 Version 5.0. All the solutions are designed to help printers deliver accurate, repeatable colour across multiple devices and locations.
As textile and apparel manufacturers aim at achieving faster time-to-market, reducing inventories and increasing flexibility to address rapidly evolving trends In the textile industry, the shift from analogue to digital production is underway. Yet colour matching remains a significant issue due to the lack of a standardised colour chart that enables colour consistency from design through production. The company is filling that gap with the Artista Textile Color Collection, making it faster and easier for textile and apparel manufacturers to achieve the desired colour without wasteful trial and error.
International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, has joined hands with Sri Lanka’s leading local apparel manufacturer Hela Clothing to boost trade for Sri Lanka’s apparel industry through a trade-supplier finance facility. With this, Hela Clothing becomes the latest apparel company in the country to join IFC’s Global Trade-Supplier Finance program.
IFC will provide a supplier finance credit line to Hela Clothing against receivables from selected international buyers and provide working capital directly to the company. Supplier finance is a scalable and manageable method for suppliers in emerging markets to access affordable financing against receivables from customers. The product offers suppliers an additional source of flexible, affordable funding and may allow the buyer to negotiate longer payment terms or better prices.
Established in 2010, the IFC Global Trade Supplier Finance program is a $500 million multi-currency investment and advisory program that provides short-term finance to emerging market suppliers and small and midsize exporters. The program also helps banks that offer supply-chain finance to increase their presence in emerging markets. The GTSF program offers differentiated pricing based on the social and environmental performance of suppliers.
Sri Lanka is a priority country for IFC. IFC’s committed portfolio in Sri Lanka is now $230 million and covers projects across a range of sectors including infrastructure, tourism, renewable energy, finance and healthcare.
It also provides advisory services to promote sustainable growth among small and medium enterprises by facilitating access to finance, and by offering capacity-building and training opportunities.
In order to strengthen its sales and after-sales functions, analysis of industry and product trends, expand business and improve customer satisfaction, Huntsman Textile Effects has streamlined its India commercial organization. With dedicated sales teams covering North, Central and South India and Sri Lanka regions, the teams are now more geographically aligned with the customer base in India. Being seriously focused on a smaller region will improve operational efficiency, customer focus and response time for each sales team as they benefit from more agile and quicker decision-making.
Headquartered in Mumbai, the sales teams will be supported by a full-fledged technical resource team and regional marketing team aimed at enhancing the performance of each function. These teams will also provide dedicated strategic marketing and higher level of after sales support. Recently, the company also made significant investments in research & technology and technical services. The increased capabilities of its R&T and technical service laboratories facilities in its office complex will improve sales and after sales service offerings.
The company is confident that these investments will lead to a higher level of customer satisfaction through increased efficiency and customer focus.
