Office attires help boost Bangladesh’s apparel shipment: Exporters

November’s exports receipts puzzled many analysts and exporters as they thought the shipment would continue to shrink amid the looming recession in the west, the major markets for Bangladesh’s readymade garments.

The use of high-end formal dresses increased enough to help Bangladesh make record high export earnings in November, exporters said.

They said when people were doing home-office amid the coronavirus pandemic, which was a boon for knit products, but as Covid waned, the turn came for woven products, which are office attire.

Also, in the last couple of years, some 20 to 25 blazer factories have been set up in the country. Some of them have 190 lines of productions to manufacture high-end woven products, a new big enchilada of the country’s shipment.  

According to data gathered by the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB), woven products grew by 19.61 percent and knit by only 12.55 percent during July-November period of ‘23FY. 

“As the world bounced back to office in full swing, high end dress’s demand has increased, largely impacting the export receipts. The entrepreneurs are now interested in making manmade-fiber-based products. Now there are many high-end woven factories in the country,” Majharul Hassan, Managing Director of JMS Garment Ltd told Business Insider Bangladesh. 

Besides, the consignment that has been held due to the Russia-Ukraine war, Christmas shopping spree unblocked that restriction,” said Mohiuddin Rubel, Additional Managing Director of Denim Expert Ltd. 

However, raw material costs and energy expenses also increased the manufacturing costs and affected the receipts, he said. 

Echoing Majharul Hassan, Rubel said, “Use of woven products has increased as people are joining offices interchanging office from homes. Therefore, knitwear users turned to formal woven clothes.” 

Abrupt rise in woven products’ shipment surprised many. 

“This export figure surprised me. I could not believe such a record-creating high export,” Vice President of Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BKMEA) Fazle Ahsan, said.

“The number of manufacturers are searching for a sun-contract. There is no overtime schedule in the factories. How the export made such a big score”! he wondered. 

He also opined that there are no reasons for foreign reserves to shrink when the economy is having good remittance flow, higher shipments.

According to recently released export figures from the EPB, RMG exports fetched a massive $4.38 billion in November this year, which is more than $1.15 billion compared to last year’s November. Apparel export was $3.23 billion in the same month last year.

Furthermore, the export of apparels has witnessed 15.61 percent growth during the July-November period of this year compared to the same period of last year. It aggregated $18.34 billion during the mentioned period.