http://www.thebangladeshtoday.com/archive/August%2009/6-8-2009.htm#economy
BD garment exports post record high
AFP, Dhaka
Bangladeshi apparel exports hit a record high in the last fiscal year, authorities said on Wednesday, helped by low prices that undercut rivals in the region. The strong performance confounded initial fears that orders for Bangladesh garments would fall dramatically due to the demand-sapping effects of the global recession.
Shipments of knitted and woven items jumped 15.5 percent to hit a record 12.35 billion dollars in the fiscal year to June 30, the government’s Export Promotion Bureau said.
“We produce low-end products. No other apparel producers can beat Bangladesh on price,” export bureau chief Shahab Ullah told AFP.
“Our manufacturers have become more competitive after the recession started to hit global exports from late 2008,” he added.
A price war among Bangladesh’s 4,500 manufacturers had helped spur the flow of export orders, Ullah added.
Apparel exports, which grew by nearly 17 percent in the previous year, account for 80 percent of the impoverished country’s annual shipments. “We have done very well compared to other countries in the region which have all posted negative growth because of the global recession,” Ullah said.
Vietnam, India and China are the country’s main garment export rivals.
The Bangladesh data came a day after an industry report showed that India’s garments exports fell by 15 percent to 2.4 billion dollars in the first quarter of the Indian financial year to June.
Bangladesh’s garments exports logged 40 percent growth in the first quarter of the last financial year. But in the remaining three quarters, growth slowed to around five percent as the global recession started to pinch.
Overall exports in the year grew 10.31 percent — the slowest since the 2002-3 fiscal year — to 15.57 billion dollars as sales of most other major products fell due to the international slump, the EPB said.
