Indian apparel exports continue to slide in October

01 Dec '12

5 min read

Dr Sakthivel remarked that EU’s apparel import accounted for USD 64.3 billion for the Jan-Sep. 2012 with a decline of 14 percent over the same period of previous year. India’s export to EU for the same period in 2012 amounted to USD 4.1billion with a decline of 23.6 per cent. For the period Jan.-Sep. 2012 none of the top apparel suppliers registered an increase in apparel export to EU. In the month of September 2012 compared to same month of last year, among top 4 suppliers except for Turkey rest of the top 3 partners registered decline in the import by EU. Highest fall in import has been registered by India followed by China.

It is to be noted that EU’s apparel import accounted for USD 94317 million in the year 2011 with an increase of 13.82 percent over the previous year. India’s export to EU amounted to USD 6464 million with increase of 15.5 percent for the same period.

Country wise Export Update

Apparel export data for April-September 2012-13 compared to April-September 2011-12 have been released. In the April-September 2012-13, overall exports to world have declined by 10% compared to same period of previous year. Decline was quite fierce for EU by 20% and USA by 8%. Combining USA and EU exports have declined by almost 16% in April-Sept 2012-13 compared to previous year.

However, non-traditional markets like UAE, Saudi Arabia, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, Brazil, Nigeria, Tanzania and Uruguay etc. remain buoyant. Over all non-traditional market has seen almost 3.4% increases in apparel import from India for April-September 2012-13.

Countries for which India’s apparel exports have declined are USA, Germany, UK, France, Spain, Greece, and Portugal. AEPC organized the buyers-sellers-meet in Columbia and Panama. The turnout was quite good and Indian participants got good business.

Amidst this tight situation Chairman AEPC made a presentation to Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) Mr. Anup Pujari and proposed the following suggestions to be incorporated in the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP):

• Additional US$ 13600 million garment exports in 12th five year plan through “augmenting fabric supply to garment exporters”. (Fabric Entitlement Policy)

• Waiver of average export obligation (AEO) under export promotion capital goods scheme (EPCG) for garment exporters.

Another important issue highlighted by the Chairman was the issue of non-availability of fabric, which has been considered as a major deterrent in garment exports.

Apparel Export Promotion Council

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