Sustainability initiatives were at the heart of Sri Lanka’s textiles-garment sector, which was temporarily affected following the April 21 blasts.

Sustainability initiatives remained the focus in 2019 in Sri Lanka’s textiles and garment sector, whose businesses were temporarily affected by the delay in clearance of raw material shipments and security checks following the April 21 blasts in churches across the country. Work on a new fabric processing park in Batticaloa and the relatively low utilisation rate of the generalised system of preference plus (GSP) facility of the European Union (EU) were the other key developments.

Sri Lanka’s earnings from textiles and garment exports increased by 6.6 per cent year on year to $4.62 billion in the first ten months of 2019, according to the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBS), which said earnings increased in October following a slight decline recorded in September 2019, supported by higher demand for garment exports from all major markets. After crossing the $5-billion export target in 2018, the apparel industry is eyeing exports up to $8 billion by 2025.

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