Even though Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka compete against each other in the global market on various textile products, each country produces certain products in which it has an edge over others. The four major textile players of the subcontinent can join hands to chalk out a strategy to facilitate others in the textile value chain. They can liberalise trade at least in those textile value chain items that they import from outside the region and reduce their costs.

This could improve the competitiveness of the region. Since textile is a labor intensive sector, better management of the value chain would boost productivity in all countries and create more jobs. There are a number of textile value chain products that could lower the costs of each country if barriers to trade in those specific items are removed.

Pakistan enjoys an advantage in home textiles, India has an edge in blended textiles and Bangladesh and Sri Lanka have expertise in clothing. Pakistan could import apparel accessories from India, India could avail of the idle processing capacities in Pakistan, Sri Lanka could get custom made fabrics from India and Pakistan and Bangladesh could become a top supplier of skilled labor force for the apparel sector.