Exports of the country's apparel products witnessed a robust growth of more than 26 per cent in July 2013, amid garment manufacturers' apprehension that their shipment orders might fall following the tragic Tazreen and Rana Plaza incidents that killed more than 1200 workers. Such a significant rise in the exports of readymade garments gave a boost to the country's overall export earnings by 24 per cent in July 2013 over that of July 2012, according to the data of Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) r

The Pakistan textile sector is anticipating a bumper cotton harvest due to the favourable weather conditions in the main cotton-growing Punjab and Sindh provinces. Government officials and textile industry representatives said timely rains would boost output. A report from the government’s cotton crop assessment committee has said Pakistan was likely to produce 13.255 million bales (of 170 kilograms each) in the fiscal year of 2014, ensuring cotton production would rise by 1.68 million bales

Cotton production in India, the world's second-biggest exporter, will climb to a record as above-average monsoon rainfall increased planting, Agricu-lture Minister Sharad Pawar said. "The growing areas have received very good rains," Pawar said in an interview yesterday. "Excessive rains in some areas will not impact the total output. Production should reach a record." The harvest was the highest ever at 35.2 million bales (1 bale=170 kg) in 2011-2012, according to agriculture ministry data. Pr

The owner of Japanese clothing chain Uniqlo announced Thursday it has signed up to a safety pact covering Bangladesh's disaster-hit garment factories, following criticism of its delay in doing so, AFP reported. Fast Retailing said in a statement it has signed the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh. Last month 70 top retailers promised to open their Bangladesh factories to safety inspections within nine months as part of the accord. The mainly European brands will underwrite r

The production of paraxylene, a key raw material needed for production of polyester fabrics, is getting stagnated in China, as new projects are getting derailed, which may affect the textile companies that use PX as a raw material. There is huge demand for PX in China, as the country is a large manufacturer and exporter of textiles. In addition, PX is used by other industries like plastic bottle making, and in the medical and biochemical industries. But in recent years, questions regarding

Chinese and foreign sportwear companies were wrong-footed after the 2008 Beijing Olympics failed to bring a surge in demand for their products. Photo: Reuters China’s home-grown sportswear industry is finally showing signs of recovery after nearly two years of massive oversupply, and industry watchers are betting that ANTA Sports Products will be first out of the blocks. ANTA, the country’s largest sportswear company by market capitalisation, cheered investors on Tuesday when it said the v

Lenzing AG and China’s Nox-bellcow (ZhongShan) Nowoven Chemical Ltd. (NBC) announced their joint cooperation on the development of facial masks based on Lenzing’s Tencel Skin regenerated cellulose fibre at a press conference held at Four Seasons Guangzhou Hotel yesterday. The Chinese spunlace manufacturer and converter Nox-bellcow (NBC) is placing its trust in the Lenzing Tencel brand for sensitive direct skin contact applications and the launch of co-branded facial masks made from 100% Tencel

In this June 22, 2008, file photo, Iraqi police officers protecting oil installations secure an oil pipeline from the Rumailah refinery, north of Basra, Iraq. (AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani) An official source from the Ministry of Natural Resources in the Kurdish Regional Government denied reports that the Kurdish government is exporting Iraqi crude oil to Asian territories via Iranian territory. The source confirmed that “the quantities that are exported by truck to Iran every day are not cru

As investment in Cambodia’s textile industry surges, so is labor unrest, putting pressure on suppliers to the world’s big garment brands to raise wages and improve sometimes grim conditions in one of the last bastions of low-cost factories. Hundreds of angry workers rampaged last May through a textile plant in Cambodia that supplies US sportswear company Nike, Inc., clashing with police over their demands for a pay hike. The violence came just weeks after over 1,100 workers were killed in the

It was only 9 in the morning, but workers at the factory of Best Industrial Company Limited, a garment manufacturer, were already busy cutting and sewing fabric to be made into clothes. This time, the factory had received an order for 340,000 football shirts from a Europe-based company, the largest it had ever had since the United States and European Union lifted sanctions on Myanmar two years ago. "We have seen hard times. We laugh and we cry about it. But in the end we survive," said Khine