Fashion brands should urgently consider moving production out of Myanmar if they cannot guarantee protection for garment workers in the country’s factories, says a new report by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRC).

The BHRC developed a Myanmar Garment Worker Allegations Tracker, which documents more than 100 cases of labor and human rights violations involving at least 60,800 garment workers. They include 55 cases of reduced wages and wage theft; 35 cases of abusive work rates and mandatory overtime; 28 cases of gender-based violence and harassment; 15 cases of arbitrary arrest and detention of workers; and reports of seven garment workers killed by the military. There have been 31 attacks against freedom of association, with at least 55 trade union activists killed and 301 union leaders and members of the labour movement arrested.

The research also suggests a connection between some garment factories and the military. It alleges that 15 per cent of recorded abuse allegations were the result of factory-military collusion. Workers have reported that factories are working with the military to arrest union leaders.

A road show crafted by popular fashion wear brands Madame, Camla and MSecret, Pret-A-Porter held another edition on July 19. The roadshow, conceptualized by Jain Amar Group, the parent company of the three brands, showcased the latest SS Collection 2023 and provided option for advanced booking by distributors and partners.

This year, the Pret-A-Porter 4.0 i received over 700 guests including franchise partners, LFR & SIS partners, etc. The exhibition included Madame’s colorful and distinctive assortment of clothing, which symbolized the brand's philosophy and distinctive designs.

In March 2022, at the Pret-a-Porter 3.0 roadshow conducted in Gurugram, the firm had displayed its women's Autumn Winter 2022-23 collection. The event was attended by a large number of buyers and captivated everyone's attention.

Madame is an iconic western wear fashion brand catering to the needs of new-age Indian women who want to follow the latest trends and stay ahead of the style game. CAMLA and MSecretare sister brands which further diversify the offerings, catering to both men and women.

Badly hit by Brexit and COVID-19 pandemic, UK’s apparel imports have been on a decline since 2019.

As per a Textile Today report, UK’s apparel imports peaked in 2018 at $26.502 billion, compared to $24.308 billion in 2017.

The decline started since 2019 when the import value was $25.809 billion. In 2020, it further decreased to $22.943 billion and 20.886 billion in 2021.It stood at $7.634 billion in the first four months of this year.

However, home textiles imports decreased only last year to $4.212 billion in 2021 from its peak of $7.974 billion in 2020.

The value of imports was almost at the same level in the preceding three years – $5.364 billion in 2017, $5.548 billion in 2018 and $5.593 billion in 2019. The figure stood at $1.274 billion in January-April 2022, according to analysis.

Fashion for Good and Textile Exchange have jointly released ‘The Textile Tracer Assessment’, a detailed guide of physical tracer technologies applicable to the textile supply chain. The assessment provides fashion ecosystem stakeholders with an overview to evaluate and determine which tracer technologies would best suit their sustainability and operational needs.

This guide assesses promising physical tracer technologies applicable for improving traceability verification in the textile industry. Today, there is a lack of reliable verification for fibres, materials, and finished products. Scaling and further implementation of physical tracer technologies can help to address key industry challenges for traceability and help authenticate sustainability standards and certification.

The Textile Tracer Assessment is a tool for stakeholders across the supply chain from suppliers, to brands, to certification bodies, who are motivated to explore and implement physical tracer technologies to supplement existing traceability models.

Current chain-of-custody processes fall short in physical/material authentications which may lead to false claims and the sourcing of fibres and materials with unchecked environmental risks. This report addresses the key challenges in both categories of tracer technologies, as well as how and where best they can be applied to strengthen chain-of-custody models and fibre/material integrity. Tracer technologies can only facilitate the flow of information, and thus should be considered within a wider context of sustainability strategy. Physical tracer technologies work best when implemented in tandem with digital traceability, and are key to supplement site-level verification, and transactional-level verification providing robust, holistic and future-proofed traceability governance.

T.Rajkumar, Chairman, Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI), ManojkumarPatodia, Chairman, The Cotton Textiles Export Promotion Council (TEXPROCIL) and Ravi Sam, Chairman of The Southern India Mills’ Association (SIMA), appreciated the unstinted efforts constantly taken by PiyushGoyal, Union Minister of Textiles in forming a Textile Advisory Group.

The industry leaders urged stakeholders to holistic growth of cotton textile value chain in India as advised by the Textile Minister. The strategy to have testing facilities from Farm to Industry and also production of clean and contamination free cotton would soon enable the country to brand the Indian cotton and its textile products on par with any other international cotton. The decision of using colored HDPE bag for fertilizer packing would resolve the perennial problem regarding white HDPE contamination present in the Indian cotton as the farmers use these bags for handling of Kapas (seed cotton), said the veterans.

The leaders hailed the tremendous opportunities that would emerge with the signing of FTAs with UAE and Australia and significant progress made for conclusion of FTA’s with EU, UK and Canada. Also with the support of benefits extended in the form of RoSCTL, RoDTEP, NTTM and PM MITRA schemes, the demand for quality cotton would increase exponentially. They said that the efforts made by Goyal would bring back the dominance of India in the international market. They appreciated the decision of using right seeds, adoption of modern technology and progressive agricultural practices would enable India to increase the yield and profit margins of the cotton farmers.

Driven by robust sales during the quarter, the Q1 net income of AV Birla group firm Century Textiles and Industries jumped by 78 per cent to Rs63 crore.

Primarily engaged in textiles, pulp and paper products, the company’ sales grew by 41 per cent to Rs 1,170 crore compared to the year-ago period.

JC Laddha, Managing Director, attributed the growth to the high operational efficiency and improved market demand. The pulp and paper business has performed exceptionally well during the reporting quarter, especially with increased demand in the paper and tissue segment, he said.

Supported by good demand for fabrics for apparel, the textiles business saw impressive growth The pulp and paper business saw sales increasing 49 per cent to Rs 857 crore. This was on the back of better capacity utilisation, which touched 97 per cent leading to a production increase of paper and tissue segments by 17 per cent and 14 per cent, respectively, on a year-on-year basis.

Despite ongoing political and economic crisis, Sri Lanka has registered an impressive growth in garment and textile exports. in the first five month of this year despite the ongoing economic and political crisis. The country’s garment exports grew by 16.7 per cent to $2,206.6 million in January-May 2022 over exports worth 1,890.9 million in the same period of previous year, according to the statistics released by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan textile exports increased by 17.9 per cent year-on-year to $149.2 million during the same period. However, exports of other made-up textile articles stood at $52.7 million during January-May 2022, registering a decline of 3.2 per cent year-on-year, according to the central bank’s report ‘External Sector Performance – May 2022’.

Textiles and garments exports accounted for 56.40 per cent of all industrial exports from Sri Lanka during the five-month period of this year, the report showed.

On the other hand, imports of textiles and textile articles rose by 19.6 per cent to $1,404.7 million, while clothing and accessories imports were up by 21.4 per cent to $109.7 million during January-May 2022.

South India Textile Research Association (SITRA), a textile research organisation here, plans to set up a centre of excellence in Tiruppur as a joint initiative with the Dyers Association of Tiruppur.

PrakashVasudevan, Director, SITRA says, the association working with Tiruppur cluster for almost eight years and wanted to promote green processing among textile units in the cluster. The plan was to set up a centre in Tiruppur, train processing sector personnel, promote use of eco-friendly chemicals, reduce use of water and energy, have a laboratory, demonstrate new technologies, and offer certifications too. This will be an exhaustive facility that will come up at a cost of Rs 70 crore to Rs 80 crore, he says

SITRA had worked with the spinning sector for several decades, extended its work to medical textiles, and wanted to strengthen its research and expand its work to the knitwear cluster in Tiruppur, he adds.

Fashion experts are giving up hope for a short-term peaceful resolution to the Russia-Ukraine conflict and exiting from the country. H&M has announced plans to exit business in Russia. The decision involves closing of 170 stores and laying off of 6,000 employee

hen retailers like Zara parent Inditex, luxury giants LVMH and Kering, and online retailers Yoox Net-a-Porter and Farfetch have suspended sales in Russia to avoid running afoul of Western sanctions, and partly to head off public outcry. It worked — photos of dark Zara and Dior stores inside Moscow shopping malls satisfied most consumers, even if some knew their owners could theoretically turn the lights back on anytime they wanted.

That middle ground is increasingly unviable, as the war drags on and atrocities such as the massacre in the Ukrainian town of Bucha come to light.

Brands now face a choice: they can shut their Russian operations entirely, as H&M and Nike have done. They can sell their Russian businesses, as off-price retailer T.J. Maxx did when it sold a 25 percent stake in the Russian retailer Familia. Or they can continue with a wait-and-see approach.

The Bangladesh Bank extended the increased borrowing limit from the Export Development Fund (EDF) for textile millers and garment makers to December 31 this year.

In January, the central bank raised the loan limit to $30 million from $25 million in order to help exporters offset the business slowdown originating from the coronavirus pandemic. The disbursement deadline was set for June 30, 2022.

Now, the facility for the members of the Bangladesh Textile Mills Association and the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association has been extended to December 31, according to a notice of the central bank. This is the third extension. The size of the EDF stands at $7 billion.