More exhibitors, latest technologies, knowledge sharing sessions, larger area, global visitors will mark the third edition of ITMACH India 2019, from December 5-8, 2019. The third edition of ITMACH India will be held from December 5-8, 2019, in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, an most important hub for textile manufacturing in the country. This edition of ITMACH India will be important for the textile industry, especially in the Asian region, being the first large scale show in India, just about six months after ITMA 2019, in Barcelona.

Over 500 exhibitors are expected to attend the event who will display latest technologies. A number of important players in the textile engineering industry have already signed up as exhibitors. An added attraction at ITMACH India this time is a series of conferences, which will have renowned international speakers, and will attract a global audience. Indian Textile Sourcing (ITS) Exhibition 2019 will be held concurrently to ITMACH India 2019.

Pakistan’s share in the European Union’s imports increased by 0.5 per cent in both knitted and woven categories over 2013-2017. That means GSP Plus status, valid till 2023, hasn’t helped much. However, over the same time the share of Bangladesh, Cambodia and Vietnam increased six per cent, two per cent and 1.1 per cent respectively.

The main challenges facing Pakistan's textile sector are lack of product and market diversification, low value addition and low export competitiveness. Among the measures contemplated are focusing on the domestic supply chain, adoption of latest technology, making access to industrial raw materials easy and affordable and capacity building. One essential area is making access to credit convenient and easy, especially for the small and medium sector, and introducing policies to make the system of acquiring bank credit simple and friendly and doing away with complex procedures.

Pakistan’s textile sector plays a vital role in the country’s economy with 8.5 per cent share in GDP, a 40 per cent share in the industrial workforce, a 25 per cent share in industrial value addition and a 21 per cent share in large scale manufacturing. Pakistan’s share in the global garment market is 1.1 per cent.

Recent media reports in Bangladeshi suggest factory owners and authorities are insisting the Accord should transition its tasks to a national inspection body by a fixed date and not accept any conditions on the readiness of that body to carry out those tasks. If the government of Bangladesh and factory owners manage to expel Accord, it will reverse significant advances made to factory safety over the past five years and create irreversible reputational harm to the garment industry itself.

As witness signatories to the Accord, Clean Clothes Campaign, International Labor Rights Forum, Maquila Solidarity Network, and Worker Rights Consortium support the eventual transition of Accord inspection tasks to Bangladesh’s national regulatory bodies, including the Remediation Coordination Cell (RCC). Yet, such a process must be made conditional on clear and concrete readiness criteria, as formulated and overseen by the International Labour Organization.

The 2019 International Woolmark Prize, to be held at the London Fashion Week will feature an esteemed line-up of industry experts on the judging panel. The winners of the menswear and womenswear will each receive AU$200,000 to help support the development of their business. They will also receive ongoing industry mentor support, Woolmark certification for their winning collection and the opportunity to be stocked in some of the world’s most prestigious department stores and boutiques. The Innovation Award winner will receive AU$100,000 as well as ongoing industry mentor support and commercial opportunities.

The Woolmark Company has also partnered with online wholesale platform Ordre for the third year to present online showrooms for the International Woolmark Prize winners' and finalists' capsule collections to an invitation-only retail network and will allow wholesale orders to be placed.

Japanese sportswear company Asics, is collaborating with the Charity I:Collect on a sports apparel recycling and reuse initiative in Europe. The initiative will be launched at the Barcelona Marathon on March 10, 2019 where two companies will work together to collect used sports apparels and footwear for reuse or recycling. The programme will enable the recycling and reuse of Asics products at eight marathons happening across EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Asia).

The Japanese brand has claimed that any merchandising and promotional apparel developed for the races is generally made from sustainable materials. The move is followed by announcement made by Asics to collect more than 30,000 pieces of sports apparels from the consumers in Japan. The collected pieces will be further recycled by the year 2020. Both initiatives aim to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 55 per cent across the globe by the year 2030.

Enter Fabscrap, a non-profit organisation is dedicated to recycling and reusing textiles that are unsuitable for donation. Every day, 3,000 pounds (some 1,350 kilos) of scraps arrive at the group's massive warehouse in Brooklyn - part of a huge complex that used to belong to the US Army, according to Fabscrap founder Jessica Schreiber. The organisation has established partnerships with about 250 ready-to-wear labels and several haute couture houses - and the waste they collect is representative of that variety.

There is everything in the warehouse piles from luxury pieces by the likes of Oscar de la Renta or Marc Jacobs, to mainstream retail labels like J Crew, to scraps from the workshops of up-and-coming designers. Last year, Fabscrap picked up a total of 150,000 pounds of fabric.

The European Union’s move to revoke Cambodia’s duty-free access could force major clothing brands out of the manufacturing hub and worsen conditions for workers. Cambodia has six months to convince its biggest export market that it has arrested a backslide on human rights and democracy. If it fails, the EU will strike it from the Everything But Arms (EBA) trade scheme, which could trigger a chain of events that advocates fear will rob them of their strongest leverage point in the fight for improved working conditions.

About 700,000 people - mostly women - work in Cambodia’s garment industry, which accounts for the lion’s share of the country’s $5.8 billion worth of exports to the EU each year. The industry is beset by forced overtime, unsafe working conditions and the obstruction of unionisation. But in recent years, worker’s plight has been pushed into the spotlight, with advocacy groups running campaigns that have forced brands to clean up supply chains in a race to retain their share of an increasingly aware consumer market.

Indian exports will benefit tremendously if the tariffs proposed by the US on Chinese imports come into effect. US-China bilateral trade will decline and be replaced by trade originating in other countries.

Chemicals and plastics from India will be the top sector benefiting from Chinese tariffs on the US, while on the US side it will be communications and office equipment. India’s exports of machinery are expected to go up by $2.4 billion because of US tariffs, and only $714 million because of China's tariffs.

Motor vehicles and transport equipment may benefit $442 billion from US tariffs and only $22 million from China's. In various other areas, India’s exports are likely to go up $1.9 billion from US tariffs and $222 million because of China's. However, while some countries will see a surge in exports, negative global effects are likely to dominate because of the unavoidable impact that trade disputes will have on the still fragile global economy. The economic downturn will have an important effect on developing countries.

Last year, as the US announced a series of tariffs on imports totaling $250 billion from China, the latter retaliated with tariffs on imports worth $110 billion from the US.

The COP 24 Climate Conference in Katowice marked a major step forward in the fashion segment as over 40 top fashion brands, including Burberry, Gap and H&M committed to the Fashion Industry Charter, setting the commitments to reduce the industry’s negative impact on the environment. The signatories pledged to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent by 2030 and achieve net zero emissions by 2050. The measures include phasing out coal-fired boilers or other sources of coal-fired heat.

The signatories of the Fashion Industry Charter will develop more detailed principles and action plans in early 2019. Greener alternatives include natural (e.g. indigo), low-impact dyes and unbleached fabrics. The certificates issued by the charter give a clue as to how the cloth was produced: for example, “Fair Trade” means that garment workers get a living wage. “Ecolabel” shows that there was minimum environmental impact during production. Some companies communicate their sustainability efforts on clothing tags.

Following a proposal by the BGMEA, the Bangladesh government is planning to form a sectoral confederation to resolve the issues of the ready-made garment (RMG) workers. The government has formed 29 committees in the labor-intensive areas to look into the complaints lodged by workers. However, trade unions claimed that more than 11,000 workers of 99 units were terminated from their jobs soon after the recent unrest in the RMG sector on the issue of salary discrimination in the new wage structure. The government will gradually solve the RMG sector workers' problems after discussions with the owners.