Domestic denim fabric manufacturers lag far behind meeting the demand by the apparel manufacturers, offering immense investment opportunities.
This vacuum has invited foreign manufacturers to market their products in Bangladesh as reflected by the exhibitors from other countries at a denim show began in Dhaka yesterday.
Local manufacturers alleged that they could expand the denim manufacturing capacity for lack of infrastructure, technical expertise and insufficient fund.
According to the denim producers, the current local demand of denim fabric is over 800 yards, out of which, only 40% are met by the local manufacturers while rest of the 60% are being met through imports. The global demand for denim fabric is 6.5 billion yards.
A two-day denim expo, which began yesterday at Hotel Radisson Blue, reflected that the local markets has a huge demand for denim fabrics as a total of 19 manufacturers from India, Pakistan, Germany, China, Hong Kong and Brazil took part in expo to attract Bangladeshi buyers.
“We are unable to manufacture denim fabrics to meet the local demand due to lack of technical expertise and infrastructural facilities, insufficient utility services and insufficient funds,” Abdus Salam Murshedy, Managing Director of Envoy Textile and a denim producer, told the Dhaka Tribune.
To produce necessary denim fabrics, uninterrupted gas supply with enough pressures is a must, which the country is still lacking, said Salam.
He also noted that it cost at least Tk300 crore to establish a denim factory but the entrepreneurs don’t get any funds at low rate.
Under such a circumstance, joint venture investments in denim sector can help the country to be self-dependent in producing denim fabrics, he added.
“Bangladesh is still far away to meet its local demand of denims fabrics,” said S.M Masum, a senior marketing officer of Ha-Meem Denim.
Bangladesh is a growing market for denim fabrics and global retailers especially European Union are sourcing from here. As we also do business with European and Asian countries, we are here to capture the denim market, said Eickel Mann, an executive of Vicunha Textil S.A, of Brazil.
“We don’t have enough infrastructural capacity to increase production to meet local demand, which is on rise,” Managing Director of Argon Denims Anwar-ul-Alam Chowdhury Parvez told the Dhaka Tribune.
While high establishment cost pushes the price of local fabrics up, it makes us less competitive to the importers, said Parvez, also former BGMEA present.
“It is not possible to meet the local demand over night,” said BGMEA president Atiqul Islam adding that when the country had started RMG business, the manufacturers had to import every things but now 90% of the items are locally met.
He also said, if the government can ensure gas supply, Bangladesh would soon be able to be self-reliant on producing denim fabrics.
In 2013, Bangladesh exported over 215 million pieces of denim apparel worth US$1.24 bn to the US and European market, according to Denimsandjeans.com.
