Tag: Coronavirus

How Might Covid-19 Affect Apparel Sourcing and Trade

The top challenge facing apparel sourcing and trade in the shadow of Covid-19 has quickly shifted from a lack of textile raw material to order cancellation. In major apparel consumption markets such as the EU and US, clothing stores are locked down, making retailers have no choice but to postpone or even cancel sourcing orders.

Based on the Global Trade Analysis Project Recursive Dynamic (GTAP-RD) Model and its latest database, we estimated the trade impact of Covid-19 in three possible scenarios, as summarized in the table below. All these three scenarios are pretty bad but likely situations we may have to face this year. (Note: Because China, US, and EU are the epic-centers of Covid-19, in the study, we assume these three countries/regions’ economies will be hit harder than the rest of the world.)

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There are four preliminary findings:

First, the volume of the world apparel trade will be hit hard by Covid-19. As clothing stores are forced to shut down and consumers are losing jobs and struggling financially, the demand for apparel consumption in the EU and US, the world’s top two apparel consumption markets, is expected to drop sharply. As shown in the figures below, every 1% decline in the US and EU Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2020 could lead to at least a 2-3% drop in the value of their apparel imports.  Notably, during the 2008 financial crisis, the value of world apparel imports also decreased by as much as 11.5% when the EU and US GDP suffered a 2.5-3% negative growth.

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Second, with a sharp decline in U.S. and EU apparel imports this year, China could be hit the hardest. In all the three scenarios we estimated, China will suffer the most significant drop in its apparel exports to the US and EU markets. The reasons are threefold: The first factor is the size effect—as the largest source of US and EU apparel imports and with its unparalleled production capacity, China is often used to fulfill large-volume sourcing orders. In the current situation, however, retailers are most likely to cancel these large-quantity orders, resulting in a disproportional loss of China’s apparel exports. Secondly, the US and EU apparel imports from China currently cover almost all major categories, which also makes China the most exposed to order cancellation. Furthermore, jointly affected by last year’s US-China trade war and the outbreak of Covid-19 in China earlier this year, many US and EU fashion brands and retailers have been shifting sourcing orders from China to other Asian countries, such as Bangladesh and Vietnam. To prioritize their limited resources, US and EU retailers are most likely to accelerate this process in the current difficult time.

Other than China, apparel factories in Bangladesh also could suffer severe export decline. Similar to the case of China, Bangladesh serves as a leading apparel supplier for BOTH the EU and US markets, making it more exposed to order cancellation than other countries. Notably, as a beneficiary of the EU Everything But Arms (EBA) program, around 60% of Bangladesh’s apparel currently go to the EU. In comparison, with a more diversified export market, apparel factories in Vietnam are in a better position and have more flexibility to mitigate the impact of a declined import demand from the EU and the US. In 2018, around 40% of Vietnam’s apparel exports went to other markets in the world.

Third, the decreased US and EU apparel imports will have a notable impact on employment in many apparel exporting countries. In history, a 10% change in the value of apparel exports typically results in a 4%-9% change in garment employment. This means, should the US and EU apparel imports drop by 10% in 2020, leading apparel exporting countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam, Cambodia and India may have to cut 4%-9% of their jobs in the garment sector accordingly.  Notably, in developing countries such as Bangladesh and Cambodia, the apparel sector remains the single largest job creator for the local economy, especially for women. The social and economic impact of job losses in the apparel sector due to Covid-19 is very concerning.

Fourth, the economic performance in the US, EU, and China will largely shape the pattern of apparel trade this year. The results in scenarios 1 and 2 overall are pretty close, suggesting the economic cloud of these three countries and regions altogether far exceed the rest of the world.

Last but not least, the global apparel supply chain could continue to face a turbulent time in the next 1-2 years, even if Covid-19 gradually gets under control in the second half of 2020. In history, affected by the 2008 global financial crisis, the value of world apparel exports dropped by 12.8% in 2009. However, the growth rate quickly rebounded to 11.5% the following year. Likewise, should the EU and US apparel imports were able to recover to its normal level in 2021, both importers and garment factories may have to deal with a new round of labor shortage, the price increase of raw material and a lack of production capacity.

by Sheng Lu

Additional reading:

COVID-19 and U.S. Apparel Imports (Updated: March 2020)

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Jointly affected by the U.S.-China tariff war and the spread of the coronavirus, the value of U.S. apparel imports from China see a significant drop in January 2020.

Specifically, the value of U.S. apparel imports from China went down by as much as 36.1% month over month in January 2020. As a result, China’s market shares also dropped from nearly 30% in 2019 to a new record low of 23.9% in January 2020. However, it is important to note that such a downward trend started in October 2019, as U.S. fashion brands and retailers were eager to reduce their exposure to sourcing from China.

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China’s lost market shares have been picked up mostly by other Asian suppliers, particularly Vietnam and Bangladesh. However, there is no evidence showing that U.S. fashion brands and retailers are giving more apparel sourcing orders to suppliers from the Western Hemisphere. In January 2020, only 8.1% of U.S. apparel imports came from CAFTA-DR members (down from 10.3% in 2019) and 3.7% from NAFTA members (down from 4.5% in 2019). Recent studies show that there’s more divergence in the products imported into the US  from Asian countries and the western hemisphere.

Meanwhile, according to the latest statistics from China’s Customs, the value of China’s apparel exports in the first two months of 2020 dropped by nearly 20% from a year earlier.

Survey Results: Garment Factories in China Slowly Resume Production amid the Fight against the Coronavirus Outbreak

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A recent survey of 294 apparel companies and 20 apparel industry clusters* in China was conducted by the China Garment Association between February 19 and 20, 2020, aiming to understand the impact of the coronavirus (2019-nCoV) on China’s garment industry and production. The respondents of the survey include both garment factories (63.3%) and apparel brands (36.7%). Around 83.4% surveyed companies reported over RMB20 million (or $2.85million) sales revenues.  Below are the key findings:

State of Production

  • 68.4% of surveyed companies say they have gradually resumed production. Of these companies, about 45.6% of their workers in need have returned. The surveyed companies also expect their production output to reach 50% of its normal level by March and could fully recover by April, should the situation stabilized.
  • However, still, as many as 31.6% of surveyed companies say they have not resumed production because of a mix of factors ranging from the need to prevent coronavirus, government restrictions, to the difficulty in recruiting workers. Further, for apparel companies from areas most affected by the coronavirus, they report no plan for reopening anytime soon.
  • Around 87.2% surveyed “large companies” have resumed production, much higher than “medium-sized” (65.4%) and “small-sized” (34.7%) enterprises. [Note: according to China’s Bureau of Statistics, for manufacturers, “large companies” typically refer to those with over 1,000 employees and over RMB400 million (or $57million) annual sales revenue; “small or mini-sized companies” are those with employees less than 200 and less than RMB3million (or $0.43million) annual sales revenues. “medium-sized companies” are those in between].
  • Further, around 74.3% of surveyed apparel brands have resumed business operations, higher than 64.9% of garment factories. Meanwhile, some apparel brands say only their management team have resumed work or those positions that can be done through work from home; however, their plants remain closed.
  • Over half of the surveyed companies (54.08%) say less than 50% of their workers have returned. The lack of workers is a more pressing issue for small-sized companies, with over 80% having less than 50% of workers returned.

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Key challenges facing the surveyed companies:

  • #1: Lack of workers, especially to have those workers from other parts of China return to the factory due to travel restrictions (68.7%)
  • #2: Production cost increase and a lack of supply of raw material from the upstream sector (29.9%)
  • #3: Slow and stagnant sales, overstock of finished products due to delayed orders and tight with cash flows (20.6%)
  • #4: Weak market demand and cancellation of orders (19.2%)
  • #4: Disrupted logistics and transportation (19.2%)
  • #6: Hard to procure protective equipment for staffs and workers (such as facial masks) (16.8%)
  • #7: Cancellation of exhibitions, harder to explore markets and more financial burdens (8.4%)

(*Note: apparel industry clusters refer to geographic concentrations of interconnected factories that manufacture a particular type of apparel product)

Related reading: Apparel Sourcing in the Shadow of Coronavirus (updated February 2020)

Patterns of U.S. Textile and Apparel Imports (updated February 2020)

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The value of U.S. textile imports totaled $27,461 million in 2019, down 2.3 percent from 2018. This is the first time since 2016 that U.S. textile imports incurred a negative growth, which could be related to the slowed U.S. domestic textile and apparel production. Meanwhile, the value of U.S. apparel imports reached $83,822 million in 2019, up 1.2 percent from a year earlier but was substantially lower than a 3.4% growth between 2017 and 2018. Despite the trade uncertainties, the U.S. apparel imports overall still mirror the trend of apparel retail sales in the U.S. market.

Looking ahead, while the reaching of the “phase one” U.S.-China trade deal was a relief to U.S. fashion companies, the unexpected outbreak of the coronavirus in China since January and its fast spread had cast a new shadow on the outlook of the world economy. U.S. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell recently cited the prospect of a hit to tourism, exports and financial markets as ways the coronavirus could dent U.S. economic growth. As a consequence, the value of U.S. textile and apparel imports in 2020 could grow at a more modest rate than previously expected.

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Because the United States is no longer a major apparel manufacturer but one of the largest apparel consumption markets in the world, apparel products accounted for 75.3 percent of total U.S. textile and apparel imports in 2019, followed by made-up textiles (17.9 percent), fabrics (5.6 percent) and yarns (1.2 percent). This structure has remained quite stable over the past decade.

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The U.S. imported apparel from more than 150 countries in 2019. Meanwhile, the Herfindahl index declined from 0.269 in 2010 to 0.253 in 2019, suggesting that overall the U.S. apparel import market is becoming less concentrated. This result is consistent with some recent studies, which show that U.S. fashion brands and retailers continue to diversify their sourcing bases gradually. Reducing the dependence on sourcing from China, catering to the increasing demand for speed to market and fulfilling the market expansion needs were among the top-cited reasons for companies’ sourcing diversification strategy.

Specifically, all top apparel suppliers to the United States in 2019 (by value) were developing countries and most of them were located in Asia, including China (29.7%, down from 33.0% in 2018), Vietnam (16.2%, up from 14.7% in 2018), Bangladesh (7.1%, up from 6.5%), Indonesia (5.3%, down from 5.4% in 2018), India (4.8%, up from 4.6% in 2018) and Mexico (3.7%, down from 4.0% in 2018).

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Except for China, the average unit price of U.S. apparel imports from other major sources all went up in 2019, including Vietnam (up 4.6%), Bangladesh (up 5.6%), Indonesia (up 2.1%), India (up 3.1%), Cambodia (up 7.5%) and CAFTA-DR members (up 4.4%). The results suggest that U.S. fashion brands and retailers had to pay a higher price when they move their sourcing orders from China to other alternatives, due to much smaller production capacity and more costly raw material supply there.

Additional reading: US apparel Sourcing Patterns are Changing. Here is How (by Sheng Lu, on just-style). Key findings:

  • Consumption demand remains the most significant factor in shaping the volume of U.S. apparel imports. Between 2010 and 2019, the value of U.S. apparel retail sales always stayed at around three times as much as the value of U.S. apparel imports. Over the same period, the amount of U.S. apparel retail sales and apparel imports also changed in the same direction, and both enjoyed a roughly 3.0% annual growth on average. Such a synchronized move reminds us about the buyer-driven nature of the apparel business today and explains why this industry is so sensitive towards the health of the national economy.
  • The U.S.-China tariff war had resulted in a change of the seasonal patterns for apparel sourcing and shipment. While July to October used to be the busiest time for U.S. fashion brands and retailers to receive their sourcing orders from China, in 2019 the peak season started earlier in June and ended in September–mostly because U.S. fashion companies tried to avoid the hit of the proposed 15% Section 301 punitive tariffs on Tranche 4A products, which covered most apparel items. For the same reason, U.S. apparel imports from China in November and December 2019 were much lighter than usual.
  • U.S. fashion brands and retailers continue to diversify their sourcing base, yet the options available remain limited. The lack of qualified alternatives to “Made in China” is one big challenge. Despite the hundreds of apparel exporting countries in the world, only nine of them met the following two criteria: 1) enjoyed a 5% or higher growth of their apparel exports to the U.S. for two consecutive years since 2017; 2) achieved a minimum 1% market share as of 2019. Of these nine countries, only Vietnam, Bangladesh, and Cambodia ranked the top 10 apparel suppliers for the U.S. market in 2019.
  • U.S. fashion brands and apparel retailers increasingly source both from Asia and the Western Hemisphere, but for different purposes. Notably, the value of export similarity index (ESI) between China and the Western Hemisphere was as low as 40.8 in 2015 and went down further to only 39.6 in 2019, suggesting their export product structure had turned even more heterogeneous. In contrast, between 2015 and 2019, China, ASEAN (whose members include leading apparel exporting countries such as Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, Malaysia, and Thailand) and Bangladesh appear to export increasingly similar products to the United States. This explained why Asian suppliers rather than NAFTA and CAFTA-DR members saw their apparel exports to the United States increased in 2019 as a result of the U.S.-China tariff war.

Apparel Sourcing in the Shadow of Coronavirus (updated February 2020)

[The situation has been quickly evolving. Please check the updated analysis: How Might Covid-19 Affect Apparel Sourcing and Trade ]

  • The real impact of the coronavirus is yet to come. Western fashion brands and retailers know that sourcing from China is always slow in January and early February because of the Chinese New Year (CNY). Instead, the immediate economic impact of the coronavirus right now is on China’s domestic retail market, as many stores (including well-known clothing and footwear brands) have been closed.
  • As the disease continues to spread quickly, the concerns about the outlook of sourcing from China are growing. Even though factories in China are scheduled to reopen on February 3, according to the latest government announcement, over dozens of major cities in the country have been locked down (encircling roughly 50 million people so far), making it impossible for many workers to return to their job. Further, it is hard to predict how long such an unprecedented large-scale lockdown will last.

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  • Many Western fashion companies are in the status of “wait and see what is going to happen.” Some delays in the arrival of their orders seem unavoidable. However, shifting sourcing orders to other countries does not seem to be a quick solution at this point either for three reasons: 1) China remains the single largest textile and apparel supplier with no alternatives (see the table above); 2) other apparel exporting countries (especially those in Asia) rely heavily on textile raw material, such as yarns and fabrics made in China. 3) for apparel factories in Asia and Africa, it is not rare to see their management team is from China. However, starting from the end of January, countries around the world have begun to impose travel restrictions targeting Chinese travelers.
  • While last year’s tariff war had already pushed Western fashion brands to source less from China, the coronavirus could accelerate companies’ sourcing diversification strategy further. Western fashion brands and retailers may also see their overall sourcing cost to go up as it requires additional resources to move products around and build new supply chains.
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