Panama is a growing market for textiles and clothing products. Exports of Indian MMF textiles to Panama have been steadily growing during 2015-16. Panama is also a potential market for other textile products like apparel, cotton and silk etc. Panama imported around $2.38 billion of various textile products during 2015. However, Indian share in Panama’s total imports of textiles and clothing is only 2.39 per cent – amounting to $57 million. Hence, there is substantial scope for all segments of Indian textiles to increase their market shares in Panama.
The Colon Free Trade Zone (CFZ) continues to play a key role in the regional and global trade, as does the Panama Canal. People from all over the world come to Panama to do business in the CFZ. The Colon Free Trade Zone is the main commercial distribution centre for Central America, the Caribbean and parts of South America. As the second largest Free Trade Zone in the world, eclipsed only by Hong Kong, the Colon Free Zone (CFZ) houses more than 2500 merchants spread over 400 hectares of land, and receives more than 2,50,000 visitors annually from all over the world.
Panama’s total import of T&C from world during 2015 was over $2.38 billion, in which India’s share was only 2.39 per cent. Panama’s total import of apparels from world during 2015 was over $1.96 billion in which India’s share was only 1.76 per cent. Panama’s total import of man-made/synthetic textiles from world during 2015 was over $221.96 million, in which India’s share was only 6.38 per cent ($14.17 million). Countries, which are supplying man-made/synthetic textiles to Panama are USA, China, Taipei, India, Brazil and Argentina, among a few others.