Major apparel exporting nations Bangladesh, China and India all posted gains in shipments to the European Union in 2009 despite the global slump but others such as Turkey and Tunisia registered drops, industry data shows.
Bangladesh ranked the third biggest supplier to the EU 27 nations, exporting apparel worth 5.1 billion euros, up from 4.7 billion euros in 2008. Similarly, the biggest supplier China registered a small increase to 25.8 billion euros, up from 25.3 billion euros the year before. And India, the fourth biggest, also reported an increase to 4.1 billion euros, up from 3.8 billion euros notched in 2008.
The analysis by the European Apparel and Textile Confederation (Euratex), an umbrella group that represents 128,000 companies, also shows that Turkey -- the second biggest traditional supplier of apparel -- witnessed a contraction in shipments to 6.9 billion euros, sharply down from the 2008 level of 7.8 billion euros.
However, the data also shows that EU apparel exports to the top five foreign markets -- Switzerland, Russia, the United States, Japan and Norway -- were all down. Exports to the top market Switzerland were down 6.9 per cent to 2.7 billion euros and shipments destined for Russia fell 32.3 per cent to 2.1 billion euros.
Moreover, exports to the lucrative US market were down 23.5 per cent to 1.3 billon euros and dropped 6.3 per cent to Japan at 936.7 million euros.
On the textile front, Euratex notes that the top three suppliers -- China, Turkey and India -- all experienced sharp falls export shipments to the European Union. Textile imports from China fell 12 per cent to 5.1 billion euros while supplies from Turkey contracted 14.7 per cent to 2.9 billion euros and from India slipped 18.2 per cent to 1.8 billion euros.
|
|
|
|
