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NARAYANGANJ, Dec 24 (BSS): The Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BKMEA), which hopes to cross the official export target for the current fiscal, is not at all worried about the multi-fibre arrangement (MFA) phase-out that comes into effect after a week.
"No, there is no uncertainty, pressure and fear in the knitting sub-sector," BKMEA President Md. Fazlul Haque told BSS today at his office at the industrial town of Narayanganj.
Haque said the BKMEA has no doomsday prediction about the post-MFA situation for its 700 members who have employed around 0.75 million workers. "We are certain to earn $2.75 billion - the official target for the current fiscal. We are already on the verge of crossing the target."
To dispel the much-publicised panic by some local and international media, he said they are "ignorant about this particular sub-sector."
The BKMEA is scheduled to hold a press conference today (Saturday) to give a full account on knitwear industries, including the global market situation and potentials of the sector at its Dhaka office, he said.
Haque said in the global market in the post MFA era, China is not a competitor of Bangladesh as it does not produce knitwear that "we produce for the low income people of Europe". And the Chinese workers are costlier than Bangladesh and India.
The BKMEA president said India will be the main competitor of Bangladesh in the global knitwear market in the post MFA era. Because it has cheap labour, produces cotton and is investing a huge sum of money in the textiles sector to face the post-MFA situation, he said.
But as India is the late comer in the field of knitwear, Bangladesh, which maintains international standard and supply goods in time and at competitive price, does enjoy comparative advantage over India. Besides the backward linkage units for dyeing and finishing, and relevant industries have already been established.
He said Bangladesh in future will compete India in the field of the knitwear, which is mainly produced from imported Indian yarn. To cope with this unique situation, the BKMEA demands import of Indian yarns through land routes. In this context, the BKMEA president said the association had challenged the authorities concerned to show a single instance of yarn smuggling in which the BKMEA members were involved.
On the future plan, the BKMEA has demanded of the government for proving incentives to the composite knitwear industry and keeping lower price for locally-produced yarn that is used for knitwear production.
He said the knitwear will emerge as a top exporting item next year. He hoped that in the near future Bangladesh will export knitwear items for higher income groups of Europe and the USA with the assistance of Taiwanese entrepreneurs.
Narayanganj once known as the jute and hosiery city has now turned into a city of knitwear. It has housed more than a half of the knitwear factories of the country.
In 1967, Minar Textiles run by Alhaj Jargis Hossain first exported men's T-shirt to the USA. His son Monjurul Haque later became the president of BKMEA and also the pioneer of knitwear products, according to a BKMEA document.
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