China continued to be the largest supplier of textiles and clothing items to the US market. The US imports from China were valued at $13.458 billion, accounting for 36.47 per cent share of all textile and garment imports made by the US during January-May 2017, according to the Major Shippers Report (May 2017 data), released by the US department of commerce.
Vietnam, India, Bangladesh and Indonesia were the next four top suppliers of textiles and garments to the US, with goods valued at $4.695 billion, $3.295 billion, $2.250 billion and $2.018 billion, respectively, during the five-month period, the report showed.
Segment-wise, among the top ten apparel suppliers to the US, only Vietnam, Mexico and Honduras were able to increase their exports by 6.95 per cent, 3.93 per cent, and 1.03 per cent year-on-year, respectively. On the other hand, imports from Bangladesh, Cambodia and Sri Lanka registered a decline of more than 5 per cent compared to the same period of the previous year.
In the non-apparel category, among the top ten suppliers, Mexico registered a positive growth of 8.59 per cent year-on-year, while Turkey and India saw their exports grow at 7.81 per cent each. Imports from Vietnam, Italy, Canada and China dropped by 25.10 per cent, 9.73per cent, 9.12 per cent and 7.95 per cent to $216.280 million, $209.431 million, $286.611 million and $4.160 billion, respectively.
Of the total US textile and apparel imports of $40.545 billion during the period under review, cotton products were worth $18.336 billion, while man-made fibre products accounted for $20.107 billion, followed by $1.147 billion of wool products and $953.555 million of products from silk and vegetable fibres.
In 2016, the US textile and apparel imports had declined by 6.44 per cent year-on-year to $104.722 billion, with apparel alone accounting for $80.713 billion. (RKS)
Fibre2Fashion News Desk – India