For several years now, Vietnam has been breathing down the neck of Bangladesh’s ready-made garment sector. In the last two to three years, the country has come a long way. In the end, Vietnam has overtaken Bangladesh to become the second-largest country in the world in terms of garment exports. And Bangladesh has dropped to third place. As always, China is above all.
Such information has come up in the World Trade Statistics Review 2021 report of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The WTO officially released the report on Friday. It shows that in 2020, Vietnam exported garments worth $29 billion. And Bangladesh has exported clothes worth $28 billion dollars. But in the previous year, the export of Bangladesh was 34 billion dollars. At that time, Vietnam’s exports were 31 billion dollars. Consequently, Bangladesh’s share in global garment exports slipped to 6.3 percent in 2020 from 6.8 percent a year earlier. On the other hand, Vietnam’s share improved to 6.4 percent from 6.2 percent.
However, Bangladeshi garment exporters say the garment factory was closed for about a month last year due to the corona. Products were not exported at that time. Many purchases have been canceled. As a result, even after the closure of the factory, the purchase order was less. That is why Vietnam can easily overtake Bangladesh. However, this year the picture will change again. Because a lot of purchases are coming now. Many factories are getting 5-10 percent more purchase orders than in 2019.
According to the WTO report, by 2020, China has exported the most garments worth $14.2 trillion. The country’s garment exports fell 6 percent year on year. Since then, China has accounted for 31.6 percent of the world’s total garment exports. Although Vietnam is the second-largest exporter of garments, the European Union (EU) has been occupying the area for a long time. Last year, EU countries exported &125 billion worth of clothing to their regions. And their exports outside the EU amounted to $38 billion.
