THE Covid-19 outbreak has raised the need to revive the Philippines’ local textile industry so that the apparel and garment industry can respond to the high demand particularly for personal protective equipment (PPE) and face masks.
Robert Young, Philexport trustee for the textiles sector, lamented in a recent e-forum that the Philippines is the only country in Asia without its own textile industry. He said when Wuhan, China closed its borders in January, the country’s garment production halted almost immediately because manufacturers sourced their textiles from China.
“If we have factories nearby, or domestic, we can get supplies from these textile companies,” said Young, also the president of the Foreign Buyers Association of the Philippines.
He noted that 10 or 15 years ago, “the Philippines was number two in the whole of Asia in textile manufacturing” but the textile companies have since closed down and the country has been relying on imported materials.
“We cannot continue importing. We have to be self-reliant because we don’t know what will happen next,” added Young, who is a member of the Export Development Council executive committee.
He said they have been receiving calls for help from factories that have run out of materials to produce PPE and masks.
“We are willing but where are the fabrics? Where are the materials? We can’t get any supply (of materials),” he said.
Young suggested that a study on the revival of the textile industry must be done.
To help the sector recover, Young said free trade agreements (FTA) should also be explored, especially with the US market so that wearables from the Philippines can enter the US tax-free.
With FTAs in force and the revival of the textile sector, Young said more jobs will be created and poverty can be alleviated.
Post-Covid-19
Moreover, garment orders are expected to be down by 50 percent as garment retailers will first focus on depleting their inventory before making new orders.
Young forecasted that garment designs will initially be basic, simple, practical and cost-driven because customers would not be in the mood to shop after the lockdown.
Looking ahead, Young believed that the recovery of the garment industry will take about one and a half years, but he admitted that this is more of “wishful thinking.”
Unlike the previous crises, he said this pandemic is “something else” because it is a global health crisis that has forced the closure of many factories.
Roadmap
In December 2019, the Department of Trade and Industry’s Board of Investments launched the Textile-Garment Industry Roadmap 2020 to 2029 that envisions the Philippines to become one of the top 10 global players with annual exports growth of 45 percent. Under the short-term milestones (from 2020 to 2022), the Philippines should already be among the top 20 garment exporters with annual growth of 12.3 percent in garment exports and three to five percent increase in textile exports. (Philexport News And Features)