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The Sultanate of Oman is in the process of reviving cotton cultivation in the country. The project started in 2013 and this year production is expected to be nearly three tonnes. The project aims at diversifying the sources of income of farmers and providing raw materials to processing plants. Other aims include: encouraging artisans to use local cotton, enhancing the value of locally produced goods and reviving the fledgling textile industry.
Cotton plantation was thriving in the Sultanate before the oil revolution changed its economy. Farmers in Oman stopped planting cotton due to lack of demand and low prices with an increase in competition from imported products after the sultanate opened its market. They shifted to cultivating other crops instead. The cotton project is also important as it ensures protection of genetic resources of local plants.
Omani cotton is a rare variety. It is resistant to diseases and has a natural brown color, which is rarely found in the world. The project has been funded by the Agricultural and Fisheries Development Fund and the ministry has collaborated with the Public Authority for Craft Industries to revive cultivation of this variety to supply raw material to local textile firms.
Cotton plantation gives good returns and the economies of many nations depend on cotton cultivation.
Parvez Mehta , a well known wool textile expert with nearly five decades of experience in the development of wool products and processes, is being honoured by the American Wool Council with the ‘Wool Excellence Award’. He has worked with the US wool textile industry in developing wool products like fire retardant wool products and in devising enzyme treatments on wool.
A degree holder in physics, chemistry and mathematics, Mehta joined the premier wool research and development unit of the International Wool Secretariat in 1967. Over a 16-year period at IWS, Mehta authored three books, seven patents and over 50 articles in technical journals. Mehta was president of Glenmoor Consultants, which involved work for three staple mills in the US. In that position he developed and introduced wool in a range of blended products.
Mehta has devoted his life to wool and made many contributions. Through his vast experience in wool, and commitment to wool, the US industry has realized many benefits. For two decades he has served as the go-to person relative to wool science and new product developments.
The Wool Excellence Award is sponsored by the Wool Roundtable, which includes representatives from various segments of the wool trade, such as wool research, buying, production, warehousing, processing and fabric manufacturing.
Cambodia will introduce a board for the silk industry. The National Silk Board (NSB) is an industry body that will work toward tightening regulations and boosting investor confidence in Cambodia’s silk industry. It will build networks between raw silk producers and silk product makers.
The Cambodian silk industry is considered significant to economic growth and it’s expected that once the NSB is established there will be a lot of funding to boost the sector. Cambodia’s natural silk industry is on the verge of extinction due to the widespread use of pesticides that have severely damaged the health of silkworms, leading producers to rely on imported synthetic fibers to meet the demand.
The production of golden silk, which is sourced from a silkworm, has decreased from 10 tonnes per year in 2008 to less than a tonne per year in 2014. Silkworms living in polluted environments produce poor quality silk and less of silk. Silkworms are affected by the smell of pesticides which farmers use in their fields.
Even a price increase of golden silk has not given producers with an incentive to remain in the industry. With the establishment of the National Silk Board, the Cambodian silk market is expected to expand and grow.
Once a vibrant sector, Uganda’s textile industry is in a crisis. The African country was a leading exporter of quality cotton until a few years ago, but its exports have dropped in recent years.
The industry is largely dominated by ginneries, estimated to be around 25 throughout the country, whose final product is just raw cotton. One of the reasons for lower production capacity as well as poor quality of Ugandan cotton is that the crop is mainly grown in areas that are not easily accessible. Only five per cent of the cotton grown in Uganda is utilized domestically, and the rest of it is exported, mainly in the raw form. This fetches a low economic value - which has discouraged many potential traders.
Cheap textile and clothing imports from China and Asia have flooded the domestic market, which has seriously injured the industry. This has resulted in the loss of productive capacity, factory closure, redundancy and retrenchment in some cases.
The sector is affected by lack of technically qualified and experienced personnel and lack of incentives to Ugandans to invest in the textile industry. There is also government reluctance to completely ban imports of second-hand clothes such as T-shirts, socks, under wear and counterfeit textile products.
Faced with the problems of rising labor and raw material costs, Chinese textile companies are adopting various strategies to move production away from China. Africa is a favored location. Another way out for them is to continue producing in China but go into premium value added products.
Investments from China are welcome in African countries. Morocco, for one, is scouting for Chinese capital and technology. Chinese garment producers can look to gain better access to European, African and other markets if they set up factories in Morocco. They can take advantage of the country's strategic position at the crossroads of the main trade routes linking Africa and Europe, as well as its free trade agreements with the United States, the EU, Turkey, Jordan, Tunisia and West Africa.
Some companies have opted to stay back in China. Over the years, China has transformed from manufacturing cheap garments to a major supplier for international brands, so being in the country also means being close to the most dynamic market. The fast changing consumer tastes in China means brands can keep innovating by creating new designs and new functions
The momentum of China's textile industry has slowed down significantly since 2011. From 2000 to 2010, the average growth was 18.8 per cent and has dropped to 12 per cent since then. Moreover, the price of high quality cotton in China is about 30 per cent more than the international level, which resulted in fiber processing dropping by 26 per cent last year.
Textile exports from Pakistan surged by 13.02 per cent in November 2014 as compared to the corresponding period of last year. Cotton yarn witnessed positive growth of 31.49 per cent in November 2014 over the same month of last year. The country’s knitwear exports saw a positive growth of 16.53 per cent and that of bed wear was up 8.96 per cent. Made-up articles surged 15.08 per cent and towel exports were up 9.05 per cent.
Exports of tents, canvas and tarpaulin from the country were up 98.75 per cent. A growth of 19.19 per cent was recorded in the exports of readymade garments. Other textile material witnessed a 11.62 per cent growth. A growth of 1.77 per cent in exports of cotton cloth was recorded. A growth of 683.41 per cent was recorded in the export of yarn other than cotton yarn.
However, exports of raw cotton yarn, cotton carded or combed and art, silk and synthetic textiles fell by 22.86 per cent, 86.84 per cent and 11.19 per cent.
Cambodia has been plagued by the problem of child for years. A new agreement between the International Labor Organization’s Better Factories Cambodia (BFC) and the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) is the latest effort to eradicate child labor in Cambodia’s garment industry.
Under the plan, workers under the age of 15 will be identified, offered access to suitable vocational training institutes and paid the equivalent of their average monthly factory pay until they reach 15. Factories will get financial support from GMAC to support age confirmation and remediation costs. The Cambodian government has reaffirmed its commitment to end child labor across all sectors from 16.5 per cent in 1999 to 8 per cent in 2015, and eliminate the worst forms of child labor, like performing hazardous work, completely by 2016.
GMAC has been working with BFC on a project to monitor factories and help them maintain improvements for the last 14 years to establish a zero tolerance policy toward child labor.
ILO Better Factories Cambodia uses a number of means to detect workers below 15 years of age. It crosschecks information obtained from documents and interviews suspected workers prior to determining whether or not they are underage. If they are confirmed to be at least 18 years old, no further investigations are undertaken. If age-verifying documents appear unreliable, or do not match the information obtained through the worker interview, monitors may undertake an in-depth investigation at the suspected underage worker’s birthplace.
Migrant workers in Thailand’s apparel sector are supposed to earn a minimum wage, but a new study on the working conditions of migrants from Myanmar revealed that the workers are making roughly half of what they are owed. Workers are denied the right to collective bargaining and social security, and are also denied the legal minimum wage.
Overtime is also a common requirement. On an average, work days last nearly 11 hours, reaching as long as 12 to 16 hours during peak period or when deadlines must be met. Thailand’s major garment production sector is in an area bordering Myanmar. A significant portion of the factories there are sub-contracting for factories in central Thailand and workers don’t know which brands they are producing for.
By focusing production in border towns, the garment industry aims to reduce production costs by hiring migrant workers, who are seen as desperate and therefore easily exploited, at below the minimum wage. A campaign has been launched to ask brands to stop being complicit in this systematic wage theft and ensure that all workers in their supply chain, including migrants, are paid living wages. Migrant workers make up an estimated 10 per cent of the Thai workforce.
Tanzania has embarked on a plan to enhance its cotton productivity. While production was 3,50,000 tons in 2011-12, it went down to 246 tons in 2012-13, slumping further to 201 tons the following year. Lack of a reliable input supply system and frequent changes in world market prices are affecting performance in yield per hectare.
There has been an increase in cotton farming and ginning capacity with the number of ginneries increasing from 36 in 1993 to 56 ginneries now. The number of cotton buyers has also increased to about 35 companies. The problem of poor seed germination can be dealt with through contract farming where farmers' business groups will be centers of cotton sales and custodians of their own products. In contract farming, the system of using cotton agents' ginners would be abolished. Such a model of cotton production will not only assure farmers of better seeds for planting but will also ensure quality yields and high income since cheating through weighing scales will no longer be there Tanzanian cotton, is 100 per cent rain fed and is produced by small scale farmers owning farmland of between two to 10 hectares. An average 4,00,000 hectares is grown each season at an average 300 kg per hectare yield.
The natural silk industry in Cambodia is on the verge of extinction. The widespread use of pesticides has damaged the health of silkworms. Thus producers have had to rely on imported synthetic fibers to meet demand. Global demand for silk in recent years has remained between 300 and 400 tons but the production of natural silk in Cambodia has continued to fall, and now it’s only one ton a year. The problem lies in the extensive use of chemicals on farms. Villages use chemicals on their rice crops, and in agriculture, which badly affect the silkworms. Silkworms living in polluted environments produce poor quality and smaller amounts of silk. An unhealthy silkworm produces up to 100 meters of threads in its lifetime. A healthy silkworm can produce nearly five times that. The Cambodian hand-woven silk industry is characterized by strong skills base and a long traditional heritage. Weaving and wearing silk is a cultural and social tradition in Cambodia. Silk is a prestigious fabric and very popular among Cambodians. The country is known for its silk handicrafts. Silk is a significant item in the country’s export basket and is an important source of employment for women and households in rural areas.
