The fashion industry is one of the most destructive industries on earth. Clothes manufacturing alone creates countless environmental hazards, ranging from water pollution to air pollution to deforestation. A single cotton T-shirt needs at least 257 gallons of water to grow enough cotton to assemble the shirt.

Creating synthetic fibers (polyester, acrylic, nylon, etc.) commonly found in most apparel is more energy intensive since they are made from fossil fuels and they emit more carbon. Pollution doesn’t stop during the manufacturing process, either. Half a million tons of plastic microfibers shed during washing end up in the ocean. Then there is the dyeing process, which gives the clothes color and pollutes waters, which affects the fertility of nearby lands.

The next phase after production is the delivery of apparel and accessories all over the world. About 1.26 billion tons of greenhouse emissions are generated every year, which is more than the amount created by international flights and shipping combined.

Fast fashion companies go through the environmentally damaging production and delivery process more than 50 times per year and in the end the surplus ends up in landfills.

A change must be made in the entire fashion industry by implementing stricter policies on manufacturing and delivery. Finding alternatives to harmful materials and slowing down the fashion cycle is a small price to pay for a healthier environment.

Apparel Summit of the Americas will be held in Honduras from November 27 to 29, 2018. The who’s who of US activewear brands will assemble at the event. Honduras is attracting millions of foreign investments, creating thousands of new jobs, improving infrastructure and ports, enhancing education, building safe, affordable housing, generating stable renewable energy and above all else increasing the capacity for apparel production in the Americas.

Honduras is aiming at becoming a textile export leader in the Americas. The country is aiming to be the new destination for textile and apparel investment. It is providing a solid platform of facilities and benefits articulated with the purpose of promoting foreign investment and ventures with outstanding conditions that are strengthened every day.

The existing textile and apparel industry infrastructure in Honduras has outstanding conditions for investment and expansion opportunities. There are 18 industrial parks that together have a construction area of more than 1.8 million square meters, and advantages like availability of airports, ports, highways, telephones, water and electrical supply, customs paperwork, low working costs, machinery and logistics.

The textile and apparel industry has the capacity of biomass production as well as wastewater management technologies allowing high productivity in a sustainable manner. The current investment in the country’s fabric and clothing manufacturing is estimated to be around 7.8 billion dollars.

The global digital textile printing market is projected to expand at a compound annual growth rate of 16.3 per cent during 2018-2027. Taking the lead will be the Asia Pacific region (excluding Japan), whose growth will be mainly attributed to contributions from emerging economies, such as India and China. This region is characterized by a robust political, demographic, and economic ecosystem of the leading emerging economies; and a rapidly growing digital textile printing industry in the region will lead to optimum growth levels in the coming decade.

China is expected to be at the forefront, spearheading the growth. The Chinese digital textile printing market has witnessed rapid growth in the past couple of decades. End user sectors of digital textile printing, such as food and beverage, personal care, pharmaceuticals and automotive, are increasingly adopting digital textile printing on their sales promotion devices. Growing promotional activity has increased the growth of the digital textile printing market.

Revenue from digital textile printing in North America is estimated to account for over 43 per cent of the global digital textile printing market revenue in 2018. Key players in this market include Durst, Seiko Epson, Roq, Konica Minolta, Kornit Digital, Mimaki, Sawgrass Technologies and the M&R companies.

Canton was held in China, October 31 to November 4, 2018. This is an import and export fair. The fair hosted a total of 189,812 buyers from 215 countries and regions, while seven of the top 10 buyers were Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries and regions such as India and Russia. Export orders from these countries and regions increased 2.7 per cent, accounting for 32.3 per cent of the total value of orders placed, representing a 2.7 per cent year-on-year increase.

The total export turnover marked a jump of 2.34 per cent, with buyers from countries and regions along the BRI growing by 0.16 per cent. The increasing number of buyers from developing countries and emerging markets at the fair reflects the optimised structure and steadily-improved quality of buyers.

Buyers from the electronic and home appliances sectors accounted for 40.2 per cent of total attendance. Buyers looking for consumer goods accounted for 31.3 per cent of the total. Home decorations, gifts and machinery buyers accounted for 28.28 per cent, 26.82 per cent, and 26.37 per cent respectively.

The fair continued to promote global trade by maintaining optimizing exhibition sections to improve precision in attracting investment. The fair hosted 50 events that covered trending topics in the international market.

Bangladesh can obtain duty-free export privilege to Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) countries, which include Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan. At a time when the industry is actively looking at market diversification, duty-free export privilege to the Eurasian Economic Union is expected to go a long way towards facilitating the same. A protocol has been signed between Bangladesh and Russia.

After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, 11 ex-Soviet states constituted a political block named the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Five member countries of EEU are also members of the CIS. The Eurasian Economic Union was created in 2015 and meant to be the first successful post-Soviet initiative to overcome trade barriers and promote integration in a fragmented, under-developed region. It covers a single economic market of 170 million people and a gross domestic product of 2.7 trillion dollars.

On paper, the EEU is an economic, technocratic project that offers some benefits to members, particularly in easing cross-border trade and facilitating labor migration. Access to Russia’s labor market has been an important motivator and, on balance, a positive outcome for struggling post-Soviet economies. There are also expected to be long-term gains from harmonising customs and trade rules.

Bangladesh is battling to keep its position as the world's second-largest exporter of clothing. It is facing tough competition from Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar and now African countries like Ethiopia.

Competitive pressure has sparked consolidation. The number of factories has fallen by 22 per cent in the last five years. Those who have survived are expanding overseas and aiming to go public. In the year ending June, Bangladesh’s garment exports were up 8.8 per cent and account for 83.5 per cent of the country's total exports. The country has also increased its share of global clothing exports to 6.3 per cent in 2016 from four per cent in 2010.

But labor costs are rising across Asia and Bangladesh is no exception. Factories in Bangladesh have grown in a haphazard fashion, some even operating on the upper floors of office or residential buildings. Western apparel makers feel more secure buying from countries like China and Vietnam, where manufacturing is better planned and organized.

Price pressure is intense. Western customers are demanding that prices be kept under control. Since the Rana Plaza disaster, western brands will not buy from Bangladesh’s suppliers unless they are certified to be in compliance with stringent fire and building safety regulations.

Ruyi Holding Group, the Chinese apparel firm that’s taking over Bally International AG, will henceforth ease its M&A pace in the short to medium term. The company will focus on integrating existing brands instead. It will buy only those labels that are profitable and have high growth potential. The group will inject new, trendy elements into underperforming brands and boost their e-commerce offerings. It will invest more to revitalise labels owned by Hong Kong-listed unit Trinity, which controls British bespoke tailor Gieves & Hawkes. The company acquired Trinity in April 2018, surpassing billionaire brothers Victor and William Fung as the company’s biggest shareholder.

Ruyi also aims to complete its acquisition of Invista’s Apparel & Advanced Textiles unit, which owns the rights to materials including Lycra and Coolmax fibers, by year-end. It’s paying more than $2 billion to buy the business from Invista, which is an arm of Koch Industries Inc.

"As per key findings of the annual ‘Market for Textiles and Clothing (MTC)’: National Household Survey 2017, the overall market size of textiles and clothing including exports increased to $146.63 billion in 2016 and further to $164 billion in 2018. Aggregate demand for textiles & clothing was 41.06 billion meter in 2016 which further reached to 45.32 billion meter in 2018, growing at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 5.34 per cent from 2011 to 2018. In value terms, he demand touched Rs 6, 204.02 billion in 2018, with CAGR of 9.54 per cent between 2011- 2018."

As per key findings of the annual ‘Market for Textiles and Clothing (MTC)’: National Household Survey 2017, the overall market size of textiles and clothing including exports increased to $146.63 billion in 2016 and further to $164 billion in 2018. Aggregate demand for textiles & clothing was 41.06 billion meter in 2016 which further reached to 45.32 billion meter in 2018, growing at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 5.34 per cent from 2011 to 2018. In value terms, he demand touched Rs 6, 204.02 billion in 2018, with CAGR of 9.54 per cent between 2011- 2018.

The per capita demand for textiles in 2016 was Rs 4,081.60 as compared to Rs 3836.13 in 2015. It touched Rs 4,762.90 in 2018. On the other hand, per capita demand for textile in quantity terms increased to 31.85 meter in 2016 and further to 34.58 m in 2018.

Demand for cotton fibers sees highest increase

The aggregate demand for cotton fiber based product, was 17.22 billion meter in 2016 and increased to 19.29 billion meter in 2018. The demand for manmade fiber based product, on the other hand was 23.34 billion meters in 2016 and increased to 25.46 billion meters by 2018. Similarly, the aggregate demand for pure silk and woolen fiber based product was 0.34 billion and 0.16 billion meter respectively in 2016. It is expected to have touched 0.37 and 0.20 billion meter respectively in 2018.

Power loom contributes highest to textile demand

The mill/power loom sector contributed 33.97 billion meters (82.72 per cent) to the overall demand of textiles in 2016 compared to 31.85 billion meters in 2015. Similarly, the knitted sector contributed 4.94 billion meters to the total basket in 2016 as against 4.77 billion meters (12.39 per cent) in 2015.

At the same time, the handloom sector contributed 5.24 per cent to the total demand for textiles in the household sector. Aggregate demand for handloom textiles is 2.15 billion meters in 2016 as compared to 1.91 billion meters in 2015. The aggregate demand for textiles by sector of manufacturing for 2018 for mill made/power loom, knitted/hosiery and handloom sector was 37.24 billion meter, 5.56 billion meter and 2.53 billion meter respectively.

Household sector growth highest

The demand for household sector is the major contributor to overall growth of the sector with 53.39 percentage of share in the total market size. While the export of textile and clothing decreased 4.66 per cent, demand in household and non-household sector grew 2.82 and 1.51 percentage respectively during 2016.

The growth in household demand of textiles has created an additional demand for 2,525 million meter of fabrics, which is an indication of the required capacity expansion in fabrics manufacturing in the country. Similarly, the growing demand for newly emerged products like legging etc, provides an indication of the change in preference pattern of consumers in the country during the period.

VF Corp, a global leader in branded lifestyle apparel, footwear and accessories, today has selected Greensboro’s Revolution Mill as the future home for select functions of its jeans manufacturing business. The company signed a five-year lease with Revolution Mill that has been transformed into a mixed-use campus that includes commercial, residential, restaurant and studio space.

The functions of NewCo, including aspects of merchandising, design, and product development and innovation, will occupy the 43,000 sq. ft. space on the campus owned by Self-Help, a nonprofit community development organisation. Approximately 125 US NewCo employees will move into the open, collaborative space beginning in March 2019.

In addition to features such as original maple floors, large windows, exposed brick and high ceilings, the Revolution Mill location provides access to modern amenities, including a fully-equipped gym and yoga room, event and conference facilities, and multiple dining options.

NewCo will employ approximately 25,000 employees globally. The company works with real estate and workplace design strategists to evaluate its future office and facility footprint across its global business to ensure it creates a best-in-class workplace environment for its long-term operations.

The way business is done in the apparel and textile industries is being altered at lightning speed. With that in mind, trade shows that serve those industries also are taking major steps to keep up with that changing world. Attendees want more than an overwhelming number of brands to view. They seek assistance to discover new brands and knowledge on what is happening in the industry.

Curve Expo has trend areas where attendees can discover the latest innovations, a philanthropic aim and specialized speed dating, which matches attendees to new brands. Texworld USA and Apparel Sourcing USA’s mission is to provide a platform that offers visitors a curated group of factories and mills that focus on high-quality and cost-conscious textiles, a robust educational series, as well as an inspiring trend showcase and resources needed for the industry today.

To help retailers of all levels make the most of their time, the Off¬price show has ramped up efforts to promote appointment scheduling through the exhibition’s online platform. Retailers who browse the selection of more than 3000 products can message exhibitors directly through the marketplace and book appointments with vendors on the wholesale floor for the next show.

WWIN will be merchandising the floor to create price-point neighborhoods with areas matching neighboring price-point ranges and merchandise types.