The European Union plans to ban the import of products linked to deforestation.

Strict checks will be implemented to ensure forests weren't damaged to create goods and fines will be imposed on those who cannot prove their products are not linked to deforestation.

The new law is expected to help stop a significant share of global deforestation and forest degradation, in turn reducing greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss. For placing the relevant products on the EU market or exporting them, operators and traders will have to prove that the products are both deforestation-free (produced on land that was not subject to deforestation after December 31, 2020) and legal (compliant with all relevant applicable laws in force in the country of production).

Companies will also be required to collect precise geographical information on the farmland where the commodities that they source have been grown, so that these commodities can be checked for compliance. Member states will be asked to make sure that not complying with the rules leads to effective and dissuasive penalties.

About 420 million hectares of forest — an area larger than the European Union — were lost to deforestation between 1990 and 2020. Scientists and environmentalists have long linked forest degradation to climate change and biodiversity loss.

Bruckner Textile has partnered with Sonoviato develop a textile finishing machine that uses sound waves to infuse desired properties into fabrics without polluting materials and adhesives.

Bruckner is a textile machinery brand based in Germany which supplies a quarter of the world’s fabric finishing machines. Sonovia is a technology company based in Israel. The technology uses much less water and energy than traditional processes, significantly reducing polluting emissions.

The Sonovia-treated fabric is more sustainable because it holds up better after repeated washings, further reducing pollution caused by discarded textiles. Since the textile industry is looking for technological solutions that will allow even partial reduction of pollution while maintaining the same product quality Sonovia’s technology allows achieving the same quality and even better with a dramatic reduction in pollution.

Europe is getting tough on the highly polluting fashion industry. Within a few years, every garment imported to Europe will need a digital identity card stating its carbon and water footprints, the presence of dangerous chemicals, and materials used in production.This is expected to introduce transparency to the textile industry. Fabric finishing, the last stage in textile production, is where the fabric is dyed and/or coated with antibacterial, odor-repellent, water-repellent, UV-blocking or other substances. This is the most polluting step in textile production.

The bamboo apparel market is growing at six per cent a year.

Manufacturers’ green approach in product processing and manufacturing is paving the way for market growth. China and India are the biggest manufacturers of bamboo apparel and the biggest importers to the US.

The bamboo apparel market is gaining popularity due to eco-friendly sustainable production which is trending in many countries. Bamboo fiber has tinier pores and gaps than any other material, allowing for improved ventilation and moisture absorption. Apparel made of bamboo is entirely natural, silk-soft and biodegradable. Bamboo clothing is made from bamboo pulp, which is incredibly soft. Bamboo is an excellent fabric for clothing because of its great breathing qualities provided by its hollow fibers.After that, mechanical combs are used to separate natural fibers into yarn. Such transparency into the manufacturing processes is generating a loyalty factor among consumers toward manufacturers and increasing the product demand.Fashion designers are increasingly choosing bamboo textiles.

Well-known fashion designers frequently use bamboo materials in their collections. Use of blended fabric is the highest among different fabrics in the bamboo apparel market with a revenue share of around 62 per cent. In India, Tirupur garment manufacturers are now finding a wider use of natural products like banana fiber, hemp, bamboo, and coconut fiber

The luxury market segment is like a pendulum swinging to and fro from a sea of sameness to something extremely different and value-creating that identifies a person. The segment is all about delivering on a promise of emotion and about the client only but it’s now in a turmoil as it focuses on the Gen Z-influenced world that lives in the now and is focused on what’s in it for them. Without clarity about the emotion and experience it can offer, many market analysts feel that over 50 per cent of luxury brands will disappear soon.

Global personal luxury goods sale to increase by 22%

However, opinions differ. Many feel spending on luxury goods is growing faster than ever before on the back of post-pandemic splurges and shifting demographics as happening customers buy on-trend tiny handbags instead of large ones and streetwear style trends. Items like outerwear and handbags command higher prices due to their intricate construction and expensive textiles, including fur and exotic skins.

Global sales of personal luxury goods including leather accessories, clothes, footwear, jewellery and watches are expected to grow by 22 per cent this year, to around $367 billion from $290 billion in 2021, says a Bain Consultancy study commissioned by Altagamma Association the Italian luxury brands committee composed of companies in the fields of design and fashion of high-end producers. “Consumption is back at pre-crisis levels, but it is also a rebirth, since there is a new consumer base that is younger, and some pockets of consumers that have been unlocked during COVID are here to stay and growing, like subcultures and ethnic groups in the US,'' said Bain partner Claudia D'Arpizio, Co-author.

This tremendous growth is a result of a sharp 2021 recovery from global pandemic lockdowns which has created a strong trajectory despite an expected recession in 2023 due to higher raw material and energy prices. Bain predicts the segment will expand to between €550- 570 billion in the next five years.

Rising prices makes segment uncertain

The rise of demand in the luxury segment is also co-related with EDITED Global data and analytics company, which says the global average luxury prices in 2022 are at a four-year high, which is 7 per cent above 2020 and 25 per cent more expensive than in 2019. But that is not deterring consumers in the ultra-luxury bracket of Louis Vuitton, Balenciaga's City, Fendi and Prada among others. Even the prices of items which represent an accessible buy into designer brands have seen a significant upsurge proving that luxury fashion has become even more exclusive after Covid times.

T-shirts for men are 55 per cent more expensive than in 2019 and 15 per cent more for women. While four years ago, a cotton jersey tee with a logo at Prada was once $740 online, now it retails at $924, a 25 per cent increase, and yes, people are still buying. However, all is not well as lockdowns in China have halted spending, oil prices rising and store closures and embargoes in Russia and Ukraine and other war-ravaged zones have upset the apple cart globally.

Prices have not yet stopped rising as global markets are expected to experience continued economic fallout through the next few years of the post-pandemic situation and Ukraine war backlashes. Retailers can't keep passing these high costs on to well-heeled customers and the luxury segment has to become more inclusive to maintain itself. Style may be a way to say who you are without speaking, but luxury brands still have to re-invent themselves in a changed world.

Traders in Pakistan are against the imposition of regulatory duty on yarn and thread. They say, yarn and thread are the raw materials of the textile sector and duty on them is not acceptable as the imposition of duty will adversely affect textile exports and throw people in the textile sector out of employment.

Since the textile sector is the backbone of the country’s exports, and most of the export earnings come from this sector, the imposition of duty on this sector would cause the sector to suffer from a severe financial crisis which will directly harm the economy.

Pakistan is an importer of polyester filament yarn which is the main raw material in textiles because yarn is not a finished product. Cotton has been replaced by yarn and the textile industry in Pakistan is largely dependent on imported yarn. Pakistan has a 17 per cent general sales tax on textile exports. To improve the liquidity position of exporters and competitiveness in the global market, and to prevent fraud and smuggling, the textile industry wants zero rating to be brought back. Due to the ongoing economic crisis in Pakistan, a shortage of gas and expensive electricity, the cost of production is already at high levels and due to the financial crisis most of the textile mills have closed down and more are on the verge of closing down.

Victoria’s Secret will not use cashmere any more in its products. The brand joins dozens of other companies that have banned cashmere. China and Mongolia are responsible for 90 per cent of the world’s cashmere but the goats in cashmere farms are subject to unethical treatment. Terrified goats are pinned to the ground while workers rip out their hair with sharp metal combs so violently that the animals scream in pain and sustain bloody cuts. The negative environmental impact of cashmere production is greater than that of any other animal-derived material.

The industry is a significant contributor to soil degradation, which turns grasslands into deserts, including in Mongolia, where 90 per cent of the land is in danger of desertification. Alternatives to animal-derived materials exist in the form of vegan fabrics including soy cashmere, recycled polyester, organic and sustainably farmed hemp, bamboo as well as modal, Tencel and viscose made from sustainably harvested wood.

Victoria’s Secret owns the brands Victoria’s Secret and Pink. After nearly a year and a half as an independent, publicly-traded company, the company continues to make significant progress in its transformation and mission to celebrate and champion all women. It has created a solid financial platform with a new, more agile operating structure.

Andrea Guerra will be the next CEO of fashion house Prada. Guerra, 57, is one of Italy’s high profile executives, serving as the long-time CEO of Luxottica, the world’s largest eyewear company, followed by a stint at the Eataly global chain of eateries and marketplace for Italian-produced specialties.

Most recently, he was in executive positions at the French conglomerate LVMH. Prada is aiming at a 40 per cent revenue growth. The Italian luxury group will do this by boosting its online business and the profitability of physical stores. The family-owned group targets an operating profit of 20 per cent of total sales, more than twice the 2019 level. It also aims to double the proportion of online sales to 15 per cent of retail revenues over that timeframe.

The group's strategy focuses on direct distribution to increase store productivity and online penetration. Last year, due to store closures and lack of tourism, Prada’s sales fell to €2.4 billion. The global health emergency interrupted two years of sales recovery at Prada, the result of a revamp plan focused on boosting e-commerce and sticking to full-price sales. Like the rest of the luxury sector, the group started to see the first signs of a rebound last summer. Besides the Prada and Miu Miu fashion houses, the Prada group also includes the footwear companies Church's and Car Shoe, as well as the pastry shop Marchese with 627 stores in 70 countries.

Exporters in Tiruppur are against an increase in the export credit rate. As per Tiruppur Exporter’s Association (TEA), if banks resort to increase the export credit rate at this juncture, competitiveness of Tiruppur’s knitwear export sector will be reduced and this will happen at a time when India’s competing countries have reduced the rate of interest and have gone in for a deep depreciation of their currencies.

Tiruppur wants an increase of the interest subvention provided under the Interest Equalization Scheme from three per cent to five per cent across the board as existing in the pre-Covid period. Exporters also want the export refinance scheme to be extended to banks to augment export credit. Under such a mechanism, banks would be encouraged to provide export credit in rupee to exporters and the same amount could be refinanced by the RBI at the repo rate.

This is expected to bring down the interest cost for export credit and provide the much needed competitiveness to Indian exports. Tiruppur’s knitwear exports have been falling for the last four months due to the challenging unusual business scenario in the global market and the twin impact of the Ukraine war and Covid pandemic. Tiruppur’s apparel exports fell 21 per cent in October 2022 from October 2021.

Shein’s global brand operations will be headed by Jessica Liu.

She comes to the role from southeast Asian e-commerce giant Lazada, where she served as president from 2020 to 2021. Prior to that, Liu has also been with Alibaba and Amazon. So she brings rich experience in the e-commerce sector across global markets. Shein founded in 2008 is a Chinese fastfashion company. In 2021, Shein managed to break into the US and European markets and achieved a gross merchandise value of $20 billion. Shein is upgrading hundreds of factories in its supply chain. Shein is the most searched fashion brand globally, topping searches across 113 countries, and is the largest online-only retailer in the world, producing between 35,000 and 1,00,000 new garments a day. The Chinese e-commerce store has exploded in popularity, and its fast-rate production has made rivals unable to keep up. While the clothing retailer has steadily fed the appetite for super trendy, budget-friendly threads, the true cost of the fast-fashion giant has led activists to criticize its business model and call for change. Shein is known for extremely low-priced and trendy apparel and accessories but is trying to sell more higher-price products with fatter profit margins. Shein currently ships its merchandise from China to more than 150 countries.

Global Sourcing Fair will take place in Vietnam, April 26 to 28, 2023.

The fair, the first of its kind in Vietnam, is expected to bring together more than 500 booths and attract more than 6,000 buyers from the US, Europe, Asia and other parts of the world. Global Sourcing Fair is expected to give visitors an opportunity to discover new and popular products of key industries in Vietnam, including household appliances, furniture, gifts, handicrafts, fashion, accessories, textiles and fashion accessories. Suppliers participating in the fair are mainly those who are qualified for exporting goods. From now on Global Sourcing Fair is scheduled to be organized every year in the country.

Vietnam is one of the important and strategic destinations for supplies, and is becoming a manufacturing center of the world thanks to its advantages in terms of geographic location, import-export taxes and improved infrastructure. Businesses and buyers have started looking for supplies of goods from Vietnam. The country’s textile and garment exports rose by 21 per cent during January 2022 to October 2022. The US had a 46 per cent share in these exports. Other major destinations for Vietnam’s textile and garment exports are Japan and South Korea.