Local Jaipur exporters and their associations are stepping up efforts – at the individual level as well as government level to boost exports. As per Vimal Shah, President, Garment Exporters Association of Rajasthan (GEAR), exporters are trying their best to become eco-friendly and follow sustainability. As per an Apparel Resources report, exporters have also urged the state government to support the development of green textile park in the state to ensure the usage of recycled yarn and every possible aspect of the green supply chain. Dinesh Gupta, CEO, Sekawati Impex, foresees good expansion plans in the next two years. The company’s currently focuses on GOTS-certified products now.

Jaipur’s apparel manufacturers and especially exporters have also urged the government to support for the establishment of a research or development centre where one can avail live demo of all kinds of available technology. Timely release of refund, clearing subsidies and ease of doing business should be top priority of Government says Aseem Singla, Director, Fashion Images Overseas which caters to the buyers of Japan as well as Australia.

Exporters are also focusing more on home products. As far as specific products are concerned, tunics still dominate the domestic industry and are expected to remain so in the near future also as from last few years. Anuj Mundra, CMD, Nandani Creation, who owns the platform www.jaipurkurti.com and has seen three times growth in the last few months as far as the online sales are concerned.

As per Siddharth Rajgopal, Executive Director, Cotton Textile Export Promotion Council (CTEPC) cotton textile exports are expected to grow by 10 per cent in the next few months to complete the year with exports matching last year’s level.

Rajgopal said, according to the quick estimates released by the Ministry of Commerce, cotton textile exports grew 8.54 per cent to $869 million in November from a year earlier. Readymade garment exports stood at $1,043 million compared with $1,056 million last November. Exports of cotton textiles in the April- November period declined 12.7 per cent. Rajagopal attributed this to the slump in exports in April and May this year.

A Sakthivel, Chairman, AEPC, said garment exports in September and October were good and in November, they were almost equal to the level seen in the year earlier period. Exporters are getting orders for medical textiles from regular markets, he added.

As per the Center for an Urban Future (CUF), over 1,000 stores were shuttered in New York this year due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the largest number of closures recorded by the think tank in the 13 years since it began tracking the figure. There are currently 6,891 chain stores operating across New York’s five boroughs, down 13.3 per cent from 7,948 at the end of 2019. By comparison, the decrease in retail store numbers between 2018 and 2019 was only 3.7 per cent. It is worth noting, however, that 2020 is the first year that CUF has included 160 temporary closures in its count.

Out of the five boroughs, Manhattan saw the biggest number of chain store closures in 2020, accounting for 520 of the total 1,057 closures in the city, or 49%.

Both clothing and accessories stores and beauty destinations have closed 22 per cebt of their locations in New York over the last twelve months. Among the clothing and accessories retailers shuttering their New York locations, BCBG Max Azria permanently closed all six of its stores, as did tween fashion chain Justice, sold to Bluestar Alliance by Ascena in November, as part of the latter’s bankruptcy process.

Other brands that shuttered all of their New York locations in 2020 include New York & Co, which ran 17 stores in the city at the end of 2019, Brooklyn Industries, Lucky Brand Jeans and Motherhood Maternity, while Jimmy Jazz currently lists all 26 of its stores as temporarily closed.

The number of chain beauty stores and salons in New York fell from 148 to 116 in 2020, with a large number of closures contributed by MAC Cosmetics, which cut its fleet in the city from 34 locations to 9.

Around, 193 international buyers from 20 countries, will hold virtual business appointments with ProColumbia between January 18 and February 5. The international delegation is led to a greater extent by the United States, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Mexico, Puerto Rico and Guatemala. From Europe there will be buyers from Germany, Spain, Portugal, France, among other destinations.

Among the categories that international buyers will be looking for the most in virtual appointments, are textile fibers, technical textiles and a complete package of casual clothing, formal wear, jeanswear, underwear and swimwear, mainly. Likewise, there will be the presence of VIP buyers such as Super Éxito, Almacenes De Prati, Etafashion, Marathon Sports, El ÉxitoBetancur, among others.

Similarly, ProColombia will carry out commercial agendas with about 12 buyer companies from The United States, Ecuador, Mexico and Guatemala, who will come to see the facilities of companies in the fashion sector in Colombia. It is worth noting that, between January and November 2020, fashion exports reached $ 605 million, according to figures from Dane with analysis from ProColombia. The main purchasing countries were the United States, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Costa Rica, Brazil and Chile. While the garments most in demand abroad were fabrics and fabrics, girdles and control clothing, jeans, women’s underwear and leather manufacturers.

The Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) organized a webinar to promote import substitution of polyester fabric and to explore new sources in association with Reliance Industries (RIL). Titled ‘Sourcing of Polyester Fabric’, the seminar was attended by 50 industry players.

Reliance Industries partners shared their fabric supply chain to India and updated on new fabric sourcing at the webinar. Ritesh Sharma, Head-Brand & Retail, Reliance Industries informed, his company has launched the Hub Excellence Program to enable the entire value chain to take advantage of the manufacturing and technical support, quality and supply assurance, access to innovative products, manufacturing support, and one-stop solution for all requirements.

Roshan Baid, Paragon Apparels said, the importance MMF fibre textiles is increasing across the world as a substitute for cotton. World trade in MMF fibre garments is estimated at $500 billion. However, India’s share of MMF garments in its apparel exports is just 10 per cent.

Sudhir Sekhri, Chairman, Export Promotion Sub Committee, AEPC, appealed to Reliance Industries to divert its focus from production of fibers to high-end fabrics.

The VF Foundation invested more than $320,000 towards welfare of garment workers throughout the Asia-Pacific region, including its two most recent grants in India & Cambodia.

Throughout India, garment workers and their children have grappled with challenges wrought by COVID-19. Over 80 per cent of Indian apparel workers surveyed by GoodWeave report they lost their job since the beginning of the pandemic. Many of those people have struggled to put food on the table for their families ever since.

To help those impacted most by the global pandemic, The VF Foundation donated $50,000 to Goodweave for relief work in India. The donation directly funded enough food packs to feed nearly 4,000 families of four for up to one month. Filled with rice, flour, dal (lentils), oil, sugar, salt, as well as soap, the packs provide essential nutrition and sustenance during this critical time. In total, the gift positively impacted approximately 16,000 garment industry workers and their children in Northern India.

The funding for this latest round of gifting was generated primarily from a cause-marketing campaign conducted by VF’s running shoe brand, Altra®. Throughout April 2020, the brand donated the proceeds of one of its most popular running shoes to the GlobalGiving COVID Relief Fund. The VF Foundation matched those dollars two-for-one, which more than tripled their efforts and brought the total donation to 100,000.

As per a report by Changing Markets published jointly with the Clean Clothes Campaign, Ethical Consumer, WeMove.EU and Fashion Revolution, global luxury brands are dragging their feet on making viscose less toxic.

The report evaluated 100 brands and retailers for their commitments and progress on cleaner production of viscose and other man-made cellulosic materials like modal and rayon, which have been associated with toxic chemical pollution as well as deforestation. The results show while there is more attention on viscose compared to a few years ago, there is still much work to do.

Versace, Prada, Dolce & Gabbana and Giorgio Armani, as well as most of the US brands, including Michael Kors, Nike and Forever 21, ranked lowest — indicating a lack of any credible viscose-specific policy for safer chemical management or transparency of any kind, according to Changing Markets.

The worst-ranked companies have no meaningful policy on viscose and disclose nothing about their supply chain, said Urška Trunk, Changing Markets campaign manager. On the other hand, top-ranking companies, including Levi Strauss & Co, Reformation, Esprit, H&M, Inditex and M&S, have concrete commitments to clean up their viscose supply chains by 2025.

Fashion group Espirit is set to lose two of its top executives. Anders Kristiansen, who took charge in 2018 as CEO of the company, tendered his resignation to the company’s board of directors on December. Similarly, Johannes Schmidt-Schultes, CEO too plan to depart soon. Both of them will leave the company by February 28, 2021, says a report by Fashion Network.

Esprit’s new CEO will not be based in Germany, a country where, in March, the company filed for a protection procedure relating to its German business, including the company headquarters. Ultimately, Esprit will close down half of its retail network in Germany, for a loss of 1,100 jobs. The group is not struggling in Europe alone. In April, it decided to cease trading in the majority of its Asian markets too.

As of June 30 2020, Esprit had the equivalent of 3,400 full-time employees. In the 2019-20 financial year, which closed on June 30, the group’s sales fell by 23.6%, down to HKD9.874 billion (€1.09 billion). The group's losses before interest and tax seriously deepened in the course of the financial year, increasing by 65.7%, from HKD2.080 billion to HKD3.447 billion (€380 million).

The UK has signed a trade deal with Mexico which guarantees tariff-free trade and other benefits for British businesses and consumers.

As per a TexIntel report, the UK-Mexico Trade Continuity Agreement particularly benefits the automotive, pharmaceutical, textiles, agriculture, food and drink industries and other manufacturing industries.

Both countries have also committed to start negotiating a new and ambitious free trade agreement next year, which will go much further than the existing deal.

This agreement also represents another step towards the UK’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), to which we aim to apply for formal accession in early 2021. Both sides have agreed that our future bilateral negotiations should run in parallel to this process.

Joining CPTPP would put the UK at the centre of an increasingly influential trade network of 11 dynamic economies in the Indo-Pacific region that already accounts for 13 per cent of global GDP and would rise to 16 per cent with our accession.

This agreement also guarantees UK businesses the assurance to operate in the Mexican market. It could save around £59 million worth of duties that would have been levied on UK exports to Mexico under WTO terms.

Operating rate of spandex market is expected to remain high in December. Supply will touch yearly high, but demand may diminish temporarily. As per CCF Group, the diversification between supply and demand is likely to enlarge. Supply of spandex is estimated to gradually become normal and the delivery of substantially less varieties will need to queue. Trading under high price and small lots is supposed to reduce. Price is anticipated to be negotiable for some large lots.

Recently, rigid demand for spandex turned muted after downstream plants witnessed diminishing orders and slightly cut run rate. Some dealers also reduced replenishing. Supply tightness of spandex has been eased slightly and stocks started mounting, while overall stocks on spandex market remained low. Price of some spandex 20D and 30D was high boosted by seasonal demand, while that of 40D/70D/140D inched down amid falling orders. Price of spandex hiked by around 40 per cent compared with the bottom level and started shivering at high level in Dec, even moving down in some regions.

In view of supply, spandex market entered prosperous cycle after Q3 with soaring price and greatly improving profit. Most units kept running at high capacity, excluding some old units to be eliminated. Current operating rate of spandex market was at 93 per cent and is supposed to remain high in December supported by low stocks and high cash flow. Monthly production of spandex may hit yearly high in Dec.

Demand for spandex tends to weaken and sales were mainly driven by rigid demand now. Operating rate of spandex downstream mills accumulated to historic high in Sep-Nov as local and export orders for thermal fabrics, fabrics for sportswear, yoga clothes and bedding etc. were hot. However, mills concentrated on delivering in November, but orders for spring wear and summer wear failed to chase up sufficiently.