Amid industry upheaval, Bangladesh is a safe couple of hands

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High streets all over the world are changing quickly. The coronavirus pandemic provides led to a great number of shop closures and seen an increasing number of businesses shift over the internet in our major export markets. These changes appear to be they'll be permanent, since it is simply extra profitable for brands in order to avoid the high priced outlay of paying lease on physical stores. Actually, in potential, there is chat that major makes may have just a few "flagship" testimonies as a showcase because of their products-with the others of their organization going online.

There are major implications right here for garment manufacturers. More than ever, production hubs need to adapt and evolve to remain relevant for makes and to manage to service their ever-changing requirements.

Bangladesh should not be a good passive bystander, such as a rabbit caught found in the headlights, amid this shifting environment. We should embrace the improvements which are taking place, and with this in mind, I offer five ideas on how the Bangladeshi RMG sector can improve its offering to brands.

Number one is swiftness. As indicated, brands are wanting shorter works, nevertheless they want them quicker. This focus on fast changeovers is a specific hallmark of the web fashion market, where in fact the emphasis is normally on the continuing updating of types and lines. For proof, one only needs to go to the website of an internet business such as Asos, where the sheer riches and breadth of supplying and the way things are modified at such a rapid rate is definitely something to behold. Consider also, here, Boohoo. This British organization now produces a whole lot of its clothing in the UK, to be nearer to market and offer it with swiftness and agility. This is exactly what we happen to be competing with in Bangladesh, therefore, everyone along the worthiness chain have to be up to speed, whether that end up being logistics, infrastructure, factory design and so on.

Number 2 is safety. Among the strengths of Bangladesh's RMG industry is that it's now known as among the safest on the globe following the do the job of the Bangladesh Accord and US-established Alliance in increasing factory safety. As a business we can still utilize this as a providing tool with our brand partners. Just recently we observed a factory disaster in Morocco, and we continue steadily to see additional incidents in sourcing hubs such as for example India and Pakistan. Ours can be an industry where health insurance and protection was for far too long neglected. Fortunately, Bangladesh went through a massive investment process to create its factories safer for personnel. That is a continuous procedure for improvement but, at the present time, we can say with confidence that ours is the safest main garment manufacturing country on the globe. That's a huge offer to brands.

The 3rd sell for brands is recycling and circularity. It had been announced recently that dozens of RMG factories in Bangladesh will take part in a fresh circular manner partnership, a cross-sectorial job led by Global Manner Agenda, with partners Reverse Information, BGMEA and P4G.

We are in need of more initiatives such as this. Recycling and circularity may be the potential for our industry. Brands think it’s great and will always desire to be involved with projects which enhance the circular overall economy. Often it really is difficult for makes to get the right industrial companions for this sort of work, hence Bangladesh needs to help to make itself a one-stop-shop-a place where brands can go to establish turnkey answers to satisfy their circularity objectives.

The above provides us onto point number 4 which is sustainable development. Let us not await makes to nudge and press us on sustainability problems. Rather, why can't we consider the business lead ourselves as specific factory owners and as an industry collectively? We should stop discovering sustainability as a "expense" and a headache and instead start to see it as a prerequisite for doing business with large, blue chip retail makes. This is the stark professional reality we are facing right now, in common with our competitors. We are able to all complain about the expenses of investment (which I know could be onerous) but these issues will not go away. As a business, we all have to bite the bullet and help to make the necessary investments in factory and technical upgrading, in renewable energy and so on. The "return" upon this investment is definitely the continued organization of makes in a global where concerns such as for example carbon emissions are becoming progressively more prominent in purchasing decisions.

The ultimate selling tool for makes I would propose at the moment is Bangladesh as a safe couple of hands. Who have assumed one might ever have the ability to say that about Bangladesh and its RMG sector? Actually, we have had an extremely steady period in the years since Rana Plaza, which was such a huge wake up call for all those.

Industrial relations aren't perfect, but they are much less volatile than in other competitor garment hubs. We have certainly not had the "pressured/prison" labour issues witnessed in China in the past 12 weeks (that your US has taken care of immediately by positioning sanctions on products facing Chinese cotton). We do not have the political upheaval we will be finding in Myanmar and, to a smaller extent, Ethiopia. In fact, of all sourcing hubs, I would say Bangladesh features been the virtually all stable in the last five years (apart from the unforeseen event of Covid-19, a pandemic which includes impacted us all in various ways).

In brief, brands really know what they are receiving when they come to Bangladesh: top quality goods and highly competitive prices, dealing with knowledgeable, seasoned companies. In an uncertain community and these unprecedented occasions in which we are living, you can't really put a price upon this sort of stability and familiarity.

Source: https://www.thedailystar.net

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