Bangladeshi textile adapts to Covid-19

Text by: Sébastien Farcis Follow

The textile industry, which is one of the most important sources of income in Bangladesh, has been badly affected by the coronavirus crisis. But this Asian country is gradually converting. Factories are now using their talents to export full protective suits.

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From our correspondent in the region,

The textile sector accounts for 13% of GDP and 80% of Bangladesh's exports. However, almost all of these t-shirts or pants are intended for major European or American brands. When these western countries confined themselves last March, the stores closed and the brands suspended or even canceled their orders from Bangladeshi factories. According to the sector's employers' organization, orders equivalent to 2.85 billion euros were affected in April alone, which represents almost 10% of the sector's annual turnover. And Bangladeshi entrepreneurs found themselves with some of this merchandise on their hands.

According to them, this sudden drop in production would affect more than 2 million workers , half the Bangladeshi textile workers. The majority of these employees are women from rural and poor areas of the country, and no unemployment benefit system exists in the country.

Rapid conversion

Some have now managed to retrain. The world is less interested in buying fashion clothes, but has a crying need for protective equipment. And Bangladesh has the advantage of having thousands of clothing chains available. Beginning in late March, these factories began manufacturing full protective suits. First for their own country: the irony was indeed great then, because Bangladesh may be the second largest producer of clothing on the planet, which it exports worldwide, the authorities still had to import this equipment. the stranger. The conversion was fairly rapid and now that national needs seem to be met, factories can export this equipment.

Millions of blouses already shipped

According to the employers' organization, at least 30 factories have replaced part of their production of t-shirts and pants with that of sanitary and surgical equipment. This represents less than 1% of the total factories, but they are often very large structures: this includes for example Beximco, one of the main conglomerates in the country which usually manufactures clothes for Zara, Calvin Klein or Tommy Hifiger and has 40 000 workers in the country. The boss of this company told Agence France-Presse that 60% of its workers are now engaged in the production of medical gowns against the Covid-19 and that it has already shipped 6.5 million pieces to an American firm on last month.

This is just the start, however, as he estimates he should be able to produce and sell 250 million overalls this year. These entrepreneurs hope one thing: that Bangladesh will be able to compensate for the prolonged fall in ready-to-wear by a very large and international production of these industrial sanitary garments. From the suit jacket to the sanitary suit, the world has really changed in this year of coronavirus.

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• Bangladesh
• Coronavirus
• Industry

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