In the face of heavy cost pressures and competition from other countries, China's textile and clothing exports are in a dilemma.

On the one hand, the cost of the textile and garment industry is increasing, and the export unit price is rising, which is losing the advantage of low price competition, thanks to the appreciation of the renminbi and other factors.

On the other hand, the bargaining power of Chinese enterprises is limited, and the increase of textile and clothing export prices slows down, further squeezing the increasingly small profit margins of enterprises.

The industry calls for the status quo of textile enterprises urgently need the attention of relevant departments.

Us orders fell sharply

　　印度越南擴(kuò)大市場份額

In the first half of July this year, the mainland's orders for the three traditional markets of the United States, China, Hongkong and Japan were seriously draining away.

Among them, the US market orders fell by 8.12%. Hongkong, China is the main pit point for exporting to the United States, the number of orders has dropped by 20.41%, and the number of Japanese orders has increased by only 0.18%.

Only the EU benefited from the cancellation of quotas and the relative stability of its economy, and the number of orders increased by 19.96%.

Ma Xinzheng believes that the reasons behind the sharp decline in the US dollar orders are many. First, most of the orders of the US importers are placed six months ahead of schedule. The appreciation of the renminbi has brought a lot of uncertainty to the paction. This is an important reason why the importers dare not place more orders. Two, the increase in production costs of Chinese factories has to increase export prices; three, the weak demand caused by the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States, and the decline in clothing sales in the United States, and many small and medium-sized buyers are no longer placing orders. The giants such as Wal Mart have stepped up their efforts to reduce prices; four, competition from countries such as India and Vietnam has led us importers to reduce orders in China.

It is widely believed that, due to the prospect of reducing consumption and imports in the US market, the major textile exporting countries will continue to compete fiercely for the US market in 2008, and China will face enormous pressure.

　　成本提高 中國輸美紡服失去低價優(yōu)勢

The research report released yesterday showed that since the first half of this year, the average price of imported garments from the United States has been only about 11% lower than that of other countries. In some restricted clothing items, the unit price of China is even higher than that of other countries. For example, the unit price of imported cotton men's sweaters from China (338 categories) is 105% higher than that of other countries.

According to the insiders, China is losing the advantage of low price competition.

Ma Xinzheng, deputy editor in chief of the first textile network, said that since the past six months, the appreciation of the renminbi and the rising cost of energy and labor have promoted the price of the products.

According to the first textile network, the cost of the export of textile and garment industry in China has increased by about 60.89% over the past three years.

This situation has led to the dilemma faced by some enterprises in the first half of this year when they take orders: many small profit orders may lose the market if they fail to connect, and then they are "serving the foreign people".

　　競爭激烈 紡企出口提價能力趨于衰竭

In the case of soaring export costs, China's textile export prices increased by only 2.77% in the first half of July.

Wang Qian, chief editor of the first textile network, pointed out that in the short term, it is difficult to achieve continuous price increase, and export enterprises have entered the most difficult time to squeeze profits at high cost.

Specifically, in the first half of July this year, textile exports increased by 22.62%, while clothing exports increased by only 1.45%. Clothing became the "worst hit area" for exports.

Reflecting the change in volume and price, the overall increase in textile export prices has basically remained at around 2% in recent years.

The average annual price increase of garment export since 2005 has been around 10%, which is undoubtedly a great influence on the competitiveness of garment export which has the advantage of comparative advantage.

Wang said: "when the loss of this advantage has accumulated to a certain extent, the ability to continue to raise prices will naturally become exhausted."

In the first half of the year, clothing exports have begun to show signs of this. The price increase of clothing exports slowed from 12.47% in the first quarter of this year to 4.02% in 1~7, and the number dropped from 0.10% in the first quarter to 2.47% in the previous July.

In addition, the export prices of neighboring India, Pakistan and Vietnam are much lower than ours. The loss of traditional market orders also indicates that the price of Chinese textile and clothing is approaching the limit.

　　企業(yè)需求疲軟

　　紡織設(shè)備進(jìn)口大降

The continued downturn in the textile and garment industry has dragged down the upstream industry - the textile equipment industry.

Reporters learned yesterday from the Guangzhou customs that the import of textile equipment that has been growing for several years is the first big decline in the first half of this year.

Customs officials said that the new capacity of textile enterprises has indeed decreased significantly.

Customs officials said imports of textile equipment in the first half of the year amounted to $440 million, a sharp decrease of 16.8% over the same period last year.

Among them, the number of imports of industrial sewing machines fell by 48.7%, an alarming decline.