The ‘2020 Fashion Industry Benchmarking Study’ says despite the changing business environment due to COVID-19, Asia's position as the dominant sourcing base for US fashion companies remained unshakeable. The study found the top 10 most-utilized sourcing destinations for US companies in 2020 remained the same as last year and eight Asian countries, including Bangladesh, saw a higher utilization rate this year than 2019.

Fifty-five per cent of fashion brands in the United States expressed their interest to expand sourcing from Bangladesh in the next two years while around half of the companies plan to modestly increase procurement from Indonesia, Vietnam, and India.

Benefiting from US fashion companies’ reduced sourcing from China, Vietnam and Bangladesh are expected to play a more significant role as primary apparel suppliers for the US market, the survey said. This benchmarking study was based on a survey of nearly 25 executives working at leading US fashion companies from April to June in 2020.

Around 29 per cent respondents indicated they would source more from Vietnam than China in 2020. Bangladesh became the third top sourcing destination for US fashion companies with an 85.7-per cent usage rate among respondents, up from 60 per cent in 2019, identified the benchmark study of the US Fashion Industry Association.