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"The Hong Kong Trade Development Council has published a research on India’s growing e-commerce consumerism. As per the report, India is considered a difficult market to do business, despite substantial improvement in the ease of doing business in recent years. In the World Bank’s Doing Business 2018 report, India jumped up 30 places from the year ago in international rankings measuring the ease of doing business, making it into the top 100 for the first time."
The Hong Kong Trade Development Council has published a research on India’s growing e-commerce consumerism. As per the report, India is considered a difficult market to do business, despite substantial improvement in the ease of doing business in recent years. In the World Bank’s Doing Business 2018 report, India jumped up 30 places from the year ago in international rankings measuring the ease of doing business, making it into the top 100 for the first time.
India’s growing e-com strength
From a much lower and later starting point than China, India has staged a sustained e-commerce boom. At the
same time, the government has cautiously opened up retail and e-commerce sectors to FDI. Given these factors, and notwithstanding the existing retail FDI restrictions and entry barriers, India presents plenty of business opportunities to Hong Kong companies that are prepared to tap into the country’s booming e-commerce market, by jumping on the online sales bandwagon and/or leveraging the online platforms that are emerging there.
While India’s e-commerce sales was only $30 billion in 2017 – just 6.7 per cent of China’s total and 11.2 per cent of that of the US – the country’s e-tailing market growth is expected to outstrip both China and the US in the next five years. China is the world’s largest e-commerce market, its growth boosted by a fast improving broadband infrastructure, increasingly affordable mobile devices, and a myriad of innovative services linked particularly to smartphone applications. The average annual growth rate of China’s e-commerce market for 2012-17 was 46.2 per cent. While such growth was truly remarkable, it actually fell short of India’s average annual growth of 59 per cent in the same period. From 2017-22, the difference in average annual growth rates is likely to continue to move in India’s favour, with China’s e-commerce sales expected to expand annually by 12 per cent, only half of the growth forecast for India’s.
While India’s population is a similar in size to China, its 2017 per capita income of $1,852 was less than one-quarter of China’s, according to the IMF. The differences between the two countries in terms of e-commerce development and purchasing power mean that the per capita e-commerce spend in India is much lower than in China, amounting to $23 in 2017 (just 7per cent of China’s figure). The ratio of per capita spend in India to that of China, however, is expected to improve slightly to more than 11per cent by 2022. Despite the e-commerce euphoria of the past few years and the market growth expected in the next few, Indian consumers will continue to be extremely price-sensitive. Whether purchasing online or elsewhere, the majority of them may not be able or willing to afford pricier, imported international lifestyle brands and high-end products, particularly products boasting top-of-the-range features and functionalities.
Cross-border e-com opportunities for Hong Kong
Hong Kong companies eyeing India’s retail market potential, particularly that of the super-charged e-commerce segment, should have a clear understanding of how cross- border e-commerce could be adopted in practice. Any FDI-invested SBRT operation in India is subject to a 30 per cent local sourcing requirement, but also has the added option of operating an associated single-brand B2C website. However, any foreign company failing to register in India and/or source locally will not be permitted to operate a single brand B2C e-commerce website in the country.
Indian consumers browse and shop from overseas or non-Indian B2C e-commerce websites, and it may be practically difficult to require those non-Indian websites to observe the 30 per cent local sourcing requirement. However, overseas B2C websites that are committed to selling to India need to effectively reach out to Indian consumers with marketing campaigns and promotional activity, and they will be better off staying close to the market with their local SBRT setup. Hong Kong companies keen to sell to India via a local presence may find it a practical step in making contact with Indian consumers.
Successful e-commerce operators have adopted both online and offline marketing initiatives to boost online sales. It is difficult to orchestrate an overall sales and marketing strategy without securing a local business identity in India, and a further difficulty to overcome is the local sourcing requirements imposed by the regulatory authorities. That said, Hong Kong companies interested in selling to India may be able to identify a third party in India with a registered business entity to help facilitate selling, in order to avoid incurring heavy capital commitment upfront.
The Clean Clothes Campaign and Éthique sur l’étiquette are calling on Nike and Adidas, as well as all sportswear brands to create a time-bound roadmap with targets to guarantee the payment of a living wage, earned in a standard working week, adopt more responsible purchasing practices to enable the payment of living wages and publish the actual monthly wages of the workers in its supplier factories as well as the results of their supplies social audits.
With the football World Cup set to kick off, sportswear giants Nike and Adidas gear up to go head for the title of the World’s biggest football-apparel brand. Sponsoring a total of 22 out of the 32 football teams competing for the title, the World Cup is the main stage for Nike and Adidas growing competition for sponsorship and branding. However, while millions of people around the globe are getting ready to cheer on their favourite team during the event, it was revealed that while Nike and Adidas pay record-break amounts to footballers, they do not pay living wages to the female garment workers making their shirts.
Nike and Adidas generate sufficient revenue to be able to pay living wages across their supply chains, but chose to prioritise other areas, such as marketing and sponsorships.
At least 10 companies will participate in the South Africa Trade Show that will be held by ZimTrade in South Africa this month.
These companies will span various sectors such as clothing, textile, and leather.
The expo will be organised in Lubumbashi and is expected to open new market opportunities for local products in the Democratic Republic of Congo following a market survey conducted by ZimTrade in October 2016.
Source Africa Trade promotes African made apparel, textiles and footwear stimulate interaction on a regional and international level.
The event also accelerates investment into the region besides ensuring sustainable job creation within the sector. Zimbabwean companies will showcase pinch valves, mining roof support elements, rail track accessories, beaters, and crucibles, among other products.
The Ministry of Industry will support the Indonesian Fashion Designers Entrepreneurs Association (APPMI) to implement the Modest Fashion Project (MOFP) 2018.
The project is expected to stimulate young domestic designers to build startup in the national Muslim fashion industry. In addition, the design of the winners will be reproduced and marketed widely to improve the national economy.
In order to encourage young designers, Ministry of Industry has been running the program peningkatan competence of human data sources. In addition, it strengthens the structure of the national fashion industry.
In recent years, the fashion industry in the country has continued to show positive growth. This is indicated by an increase in export value performance and its contribution to national GDP.
Based on data from BPS, the value of national fashion exports in the period January-April 2018 reached USD 4.7 billion, an increase of 10 percent over the same period in 2017 of USD 4.2 billion.
Wool activewear is emerging as the most preferred material with many athleisure companies such as Adidas and Lululemon due to its inherent properties such as softness and odour-resistant capabilities.
This trend was particularly evident at the recent ISPO trade fair in Munich.
Norwegian brand Devold won an ISPO Award 2018 for its Tuvegga Sport Air base layer. The reversible two-sided functional base layer is designed for high-performance activities and is made from 100 per cent Merino wool.
At the event, the Woolmark Company displayed products like wool footwear, seamless apparel and wool filling. While many outdoor brands already have wool in their collections, increasing number of brands are introducing wool into their high-intensity categories.
The Greater Than A, the sportswear brand of Norwegian alpine ski racer Aksel Lund Svindal, an Olympic gold medallist, also uses wool in his sportswear brand. The brand aims to make functional clothing that looks and feels fantastic and at the same time causes no harm to the planet.
Aksel uses wool for training and has a race suit designed for aerodynamics. The trick is to get changed as soon as one can in the finish area.
Ralph Lauren has ambitions to increase sales by a billion dollars by 2023. Marketing spend will go up by a 100 million dollars over the next five years.
The last few years have been about cutting costs including closing 50 stores, eliminating more than 1,000 jobs and removing three lines of management.
Ralph Lauren is an American fashion house. The goal is to woo the next generation of consumers and increase gross margins by improving the core product (which makes up 60 per cent of overall revenue), amplifying under-penetrated categories (including women’s, outerwear and denim) and operating with discipline, which constitutes being more careful about discounts and promotions, more strategic when it comes to price, and cutting costs in creative-but-impactful ways.
One example of this is fabric platforming. At Ralph Lauren, different categories (i.e. home, kids, Polo, ready-to-wear) use different qualities of fabrics. Instead of each sub-brand buying its own fabric, Ralph Lauren is buying deeper into higher quality fabrics, which brings down the cost and increases the quality of lower priced products.
The brand targets working professional men in their early-to-mid 30s, new-to-the workforce women in their mid-to-late 20s, and the creative class.
The aim is for half of the company’s growth to come from core categories — men’s shirting — and half from undeveloped categories like denim, wear-to-work, outerwear, footwear and accessories.
The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC), and the HEC-NYU EU Public Interest Clinic have filed a formal complaint against the European Union (EU) for failing to adhere to human rights obligations regarding trade policies towards Bangladesh.
Bangladesh benefits from preferential tariffs on its exports to Europe under the EU’s Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP).
But the country has committed serious and systematic violations of fundamental workers’ rights. Additionally, its labour laws create significant obstacles to the exercise of the right to freedom of association, to organise and to bargain collectively.
Further, the government has also not effectively enforced even these flawed laws, and workers complaints to authorities are routinely ignored.
Despite all this, EU has not launched a formal investigation concerning Bangladesh's GSP status. Furthermore, the commission has failed to create a transparent and objective process for deciding when an investigation should be launched, making it impossible for NGOs or others to participate.
Dozens of clothing manufacturers in Tel Aviv have decided to dump garments them into a pile that eventually grew to 20,000 items, available for passerby to pick through and take home. The event was organized by a group called the Movement for Israeli Fashion, and was designed to protest what the over 150 members of the group said was the government’s failure to protect them from unfair competition.
Some of the issues that are clothing manufacturers and retailers are because of the overrated shekel, next to zero duty on clothing imported from the far east, and the requirement that Value Added sales Tax (VAT) to be paid on purchases from Israeli retail stores while items that are bought online from foreign sales sites are exempt from all taxes in most cases..
The organization is also demanding that the government impose tariffs on Chinese imports, or negotiate a trade deal that will make it as easy and as cheap for them to export to China to protect manufacturers. All Western countries except Israel have tariffs in place on Chinese imports. The EU has a 12 percent tariff on such imports, Canada and Australia an 18 percent tariff, and the United States between 17 percent and 33 percent, depending on the item.
The Islamic Fashion Institute was founded nearly three years ago in Indonesia's third largest city of Bandung. The school is teaching students in the world's largest Muslim majority country the usual skills of design, styling and marketing but with a religion-specific twist. It offers nine-month courses in fashion styling, marketing, and basic styling and about 140 students have signed up now
Institute aims to teach students to make unique designs and become leaders in modest fashion and they need to be taught about wearing clothes according to Islamic rules.
The trend towards garments that meet religious requirements is becoming more visible among the burgeoning middle class in Indonesia, where, for years, few Muslim women covered their heads, or opted for traditional batik or Western clothing.
The Indonesian websites of leading online retailers such as Lazada.com and Zalora.com now have pages dedicated to Islamic fashion.
The country hosted its first Muslim Fashion Week in 2015 and the industry ministry aims to make Indonesia a "Muslim fashion hub" by 2020.
Pakistan’s garment industry wants help in increasing the country’s exports to overcome the trade deficit of the country.It’s felt this will ultimately increase the foreign exchange of the country which is the need of the hour.
Exporters want payment of refunds to be expedited. They say exports should not be taxed and that the Export Development Surcharge should be withdrawn. They feel great dividends can be reaped by abolishing this levy.
Pakistan’s textile exports rose 7.2 per cent during the first eight months of the current fiscal year. Other economies like China, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Vietnam grew their exports at a compound rate of 20 per cent or more during the same period.
Textile exports make up around 60 per cent of the country’s total exports. The textile sector has the largest share in Pakistan’s exports.
Pakistan’s competitors are upping the ante on textile exports to make inroads into more global markets. While China’s share in global textile exports is 36 per cent, Vietnam contributes 12.4 per cent, and Pakistan seven per cent.
Various problems are being faced by the country’s textile sector including the high cost of doing business, multiple taxes and surcharges.
Pakistan predominantly being a textile export economy is struggling to maintain its share in global textile markets both in basic and value added textiles.
