While Bangladesh, India and Pakistan are expecting higher exports of readymade garment (RMG) to the U.S. and European Union (EU), exports from the East Asian giant China and start-ups Cambodia and Vietnam are the on decline. The textile and apparel (readymade garments) exports from China, Vietnam and Cambodia to the US declined by 43.3 per cent, 22.4 per cent and 22 per cent respectively in March compared with February, according to the US Department of Commerce’s Office of Textiles and Apparel.
Incidentally, the decline in textile exports in March ’16 was 42.1 per cent for China, 22.6 per cent for Vietnam and 34.4 per cent for Cambodia against the same month in the last year. Meanwhile, textile and RMG exports from Bangladesh to the US recorded an increase of 7.9 per cent in March this year compared to the same month in the last year.
Whereas, textile and RMG exports from India to the US increased by 15.3 per cent in March compared with same month last year while RMG exports from Pakistan to the US increased by 8.8 per cent. However, in volume terms Bangladesh RMG exports to US continued to surpass exports from India and Pakistan.