India needs to catch up in MMF apparel products to grow in US markets, according to the Indian Texpreneurs Federation (ITF). For that, the government needs to bring GST duty rationalisation immediately for MMF fibre & value chain. This will help the country’s textiles sector to focus more on MMF and blended products and reach out better to US markets.
The structural reform in GST will also address the liquidity issues in the MMF value chain manufacturing, says the report. In spite of its large base, US apparel imports are still growing further. Total apparel imports by the United States stood at $57.308 billion in the first 8 months of 2019, showing an increase of 5.76 per cent over imports of $54.184 billion in corresponding period of 2018. China continued to be the main supplier with 30.6 per cent share of all apparel imported by the US last year. However, imports from China grew by a marginal 1.99 per cent to $17.551 billion.
In contrast, imports from Vietnam, the second-biggest supplier to the US, shot up by 12.14 per cent to $9.063 billion. Vietnam’s share in the US clothing imports also grew to 15.8 per cent, the data showed. Vietnam is the largest gainer in the US-China trade war, followed by Bangladesh. Bangladesh, the world’s second largest garment exporter, saw its supplies to the US increase by 11.81 percent in the first 8 months to $4.083 billion during the year. Similarly, US apparel imports from Indonesia, Mexico and El Salvador dropped by 0.37 per cent, 3.58 per cent and 0.57 per cent from Jan–August 2019, to $3.003 billion, $2.170 billion and $1.242 billion, respectively.
Among the top ten apparel suppliers, India, Honduras and Cambodia saw their exports increase by 8.19 per cent, 11.91 per cent and 8.58 per cent respectively to $2.940 billion, $1.836 billion and $1.728 billion, in the first 8 months of the year. During the first 6 months of this year, India had achieved double digit growth; but looking at the recent 8 months’ period, there is small dip in per cent of growth. Of the total apparel imports made by US, cotton apparel imports grew 3.85 per cent to $26.813 billion, whereas man-made fibre (MMF) apparel grew 7.01 per cent to $27.485 billion. Thus MMF apparel products are selling more than cotton apparel products in US markets.
India achieved double digit growth in cotton apparel products and is commanding 7.6 per cent share. At the same time, in MMF apparel products, India is just having 2.7 per cent share in comparison with 36 per cent share of China and 18 per cent of Vietnam.
