New fiscal year brings hope for Indian textile sector

05 Apr '13

2 min read

The Indian fiscal year which ended on March 31, 2013, was not a good period for the apparel sector, whether, domestic sales or exports. However, textile goods which include, yarns, fabrics and made-ups did not perform as badly as apparel exports, in the year gone by.

According to data available on the DGFT website, in the first 10 months of fiscal 2012-13, exports of textiles fell 1.75 percent from a year ago to US $9.87 billion, while apparel exports dipped 7.49 percent to $10.11 billion year on year.

"Yarn, fabrics and made-up exports did very well in fiscal which went by. Textile exports are projected to remain stable or grow by a marginal 1 percent in dollar terms for full fiscal year 2012-13, while in case of apparels, it is expected to fall nine percent year-on-year," says Mr DK Nair, Secretary General (CITI).

Dr Sakhtivel – Chairman of Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) reveals, “Garment exports fell mainly to the European Union, which accounts for around 50 percent of our apparel exports. To offset the loss, we have now started concentrating on non-traditional markets like, Israel, Japan, Latin America, etc and it has proved to be useful.”

Index of Industrial Production (IIP) also reveals that in the first ten months of the previous fiscal year, textile production rose 6.5 percent year-on-year, while garment output grew only 1.5 percent from a year ago.

Even in the domestic market, sales took off mainly in the period when retailers offer discounts to consumers and here too, the ‘Sales’ period started earlier than normal.

Mr Rahul Mehta – MD of Mumbai-based Creative Garments Ltd says, “The year gone by was not so good, as the ‘discounting’ period started earlier than usual both in July and January. Secondly, sales trends indicate that sales picked up more in the discounting period. This does not portend well for the Indian apparel sector”.

All are in concurrence when they say that the new fiscal year which began on April 1, will generate sales growth in the export as well as domestic market and are hopeful that domestic sales as well as exports would pick up by 10-12 percent.

Dr Sakhtivel is of the opinion that if the FTA between India and EU is signed in April or latest by May, one can expect clothing exports to surge by 25 percent in the new fiscal year.

Fibre2fashion News Desk - India

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