The Rise Of The Textile Industry In Southeast Asia Has Made Many People Feel Anxious: Will China'S Textile Industry Be Threatened?

Since 1994, the total export volume of China's textile and clothing ranks first in the world.

The Chinese have an old saying: thirty years Hedong, thirty years Hexi.

After more than 20 years of "leading brother", the cost of domestic production in China will inevitably rise.

At this time, Vietnam, India and other countries began to gradually show their cost advantages.

Thus, just like China's industrial pfer from Asia four small dragons more than 30 years ago, the global textile industry is now opening a new round of pfer to South Asia and Southeast Asia.

As a pioneer in opening up to the outside world, how will China's textile industry evaluate its new changes? How can China's textile industry find new development paths?

This reporter interviewed the China Textile Industry Federation (hereinafter referred to as "China Textile union").

After that, there is still a long way to go.

The rise of the textile industry in Southeast Asia has made many people feel anxious: will China's textile industry be threatened?

In this regard, Hua Shan, vice president of the China Textile Industry Federation Industrial Economics Research Institute, said that at present, China's textile fiber processing accounts for more than half of the world's total, and textile and garment exports account for more than 1/3 of the world, with the most complete modern textile manufacturing and service system in the world.

"At this stage, China's textile industry still has obvious advantages in terms of development scale, supply chain system and international competitiveness, and has not yet been threatened by all countries and regions."

Huashan also pointed out that we still need to face up to the reality and trend of the rapid development of the textile industry in Southeast Asia and South Asia.

Taking Vietnam as an example, their textile and garment workers earn about 2000 yuan per month, which is about 1/3 of the Chinese workers. The average industrial electricity and water price is only half of the domestic value. The VAT rate is only 10%, and if the local employees reach a certain quantity, the income tax can also be exempt from or reduced by half.

Hua Shan said that some countries in Southeast Asia and South Asia have better international competitiveness in the fields of cotton textile and knitted apparel processing, relying on the cost advantages of labor, raw materials, electricity tariff and tax rate. Although their products are mainly concentrated in the middle and low end, they still form direct competitive relationship with some domestic textile enterprises.

According to WTO data, the export share of China's textile and apparel international market still ranks first in the world, but it has declined since 2016, and 34.8% in 2017 dropped by 3.1 percentage points compared with 37.9% in 2015.

By contrast, the share of textiles and clothing exports in India, Vietnam and Bangladesh increased.

Vietnam increased rapidly, Vietnam's share of exports in 2017 was 4.6%, an increase of 0.9 percentage points from 2015, and from 2010 to 2017, Vietnam's exports of textiles and clothing grew at an average annual rate of 17.4%, while the average annual growth rate in China was only 4.4%.

"Although these countries are competing with China in the international export market, they also form a close cooperative relationship in the development of the industrial chain," Hua Shan said.

On the one hand, due to the limited bearing capacity of China's resources and environment, the rising production costs and the need for accelerating the internationalization of domestic enterprises, in recent years, some Chinese enterprises have invested in the construction of a number of spinning and garment processing bases in Southeast Asia and South Asia. They have formed an industrial chain supporting cooperative relationship with the upstream and downstream enterprises. "China + Southeast Asia" has gradually become a new international layout mode of China's textile manufacturing industry.

On the other hand, the industrial system of these countries is still not perfect, especially in terms of chemical fiber, dyeing and finishing, equipment and so on. It is necessary to import large quantities of chemical fiber, surface accessories and textile equipment from China, which is an important growth force to stimulate China's textile and textile machinery exports.

On the whole, the share of South Asian and Southeast Asian countries in the international market has increased rapidly, but there is still a big gap with China. Even as India, the second largest exporter of textiles and clothing in the world, its export share in 2017 was only 4.7%, even less than 34.8% of China.

Moreover, although the labor intensive sectors of textile production in Southeast Asia and South Asia are developing rapidly, the high value-added links of technology and capital are still mainly dependent on China. At the present stage, there is no threat to China.

But the current situation is not equal to the trend. For the Chinese textile industry, we must face up to the increasingly severe international competition situation.

Technology and brand must be hard both hands.

The influx of more developing countries makes it even more difficult for Chinese companies to make profits in textile and garment manufacturing processes.

Chinese enterprises should only leave the comfort zone, extend to the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain, develop new and high-tech raw materials and high-end equipment, and create a fashion brand and expand sales channels.

But obviously, these two areas with higher added value are controlled by the developed countries. The Chinese textile industry, which has just jumped out of the middle and low end of the "Red Sea", has found itself in close proximity with the developed countries.

How can China's textile enterprises break through under the pattern of "blocking the chase ahead"?

Hua Shan shared with reporters the story of Ruyi group in Shandong.

Ruyi group has jumped to the top of China's top 500 textile and apparel enterprises. It ranks among the 100 largest luxury Brand Company in the world. It has the largest textile and apparel industry chain with the largest cotton spinning, wool spinning and clothing brand in the world.

The foundation of the development is to persist in scientific and technological innovation and overseas mergers and acquisitions.

Ruyi group has R & D personnel from 18 countries, with annual investment in science and technology reaching 5% of sales, and R & D expenditure is no less than 300 million yuan per year.

At headquarters in Shandong, Ruyi also invested 700 million yuan to build 70 thousand square meters of global R & D center.

It is reported that this is the most advanced R & D center in the field of global textile and clothing.

By increasing R & D investment, the added value of Ruyi products has increased by 35%, and the efficient spinning technology named "Ruyi spinning" has been successfully developed, and more than 30 patents have been declared in western developed countries.

Today, the price of Ruyi spinning has reached 10 thousand yuan per square meter.

Ruyi's senior suit has also reached 70 thousand yuan per set.

With its core technology and high-tech products, Ruyi avoided the disorderly competition of China's low-grade products and successfully entered the international high-end fabric club.

At the same time, Ruyi is also actively implementing overseas brand acquisition strategy.

"The way to build its fashion layout is to expand from the raw material business supported by science and technology to the fashion brand with international recognition, forming an ecological chain of the whole industrial chain."

Said Hua Shan.

Ruyi has spent about $4 billion on the more than 20 luxury fashion brands in France, Britain and Japan.

In particular, it bought the famous American fabric maker Lycra in 2017, and bought the famous Swiss luxury brand BALLY in 2018 to stir the world.

Ruyi's development is a microcosm of China's textile and garment industry.

In recent years, the market recognition of China's independent textile and clothing brands has been steadily improved. Lining has become a synonym for tide brands in Paris fashion week and New York fashion week. Bosideng is out of the country and old with a new look. Anta, China designed and made in China, has also become the leader of domestic fashion and fashion.

In 2018, China's textile and apparel brand value list of the top 50, 9 brands were worth more than 10 billion yuan.

With the weakening of manpower cost advantage, China's textile and garment brands can also get a strong market premium capability, which is the return of technological innovation over the years.

According to the survey data of China Textile Association, the intensity of R & D investment has exceeded 1% in China's textile and garment enterprises above Designated Size, and the intensity of R & D input of high-tech fiber enterprises has reached 6%.

Large scale investment in science and technology not only alleviated the cost pressure on production, but also realized import substitution on equipment.

At present, the domestic market share of China made textile machinery reaches 80%, and some products have already competed with the international advanced level.

Republic veterans continue to write Legends

In March 25th, Miao Wei, Minister of industry and information technology, put forward at the 2019 China Development Summit Forum that China will fully liberate the general manufacturing industry in the future.

As an important sub class of "general manufacturing industry", China's textile and garment industry is more confident in the face of opening up.

According to the relevant person in charge of China Textile Association, China's textile industry has a relatively high degree of marketization, and the number of private enterprises accounts for more than 95% of the whole industry. After many years of pformation and upgrading, it has considerable environmental adaptability and risk resilience.

But at the same time, we must remain sober. The China Textile Industry and Economic Research Institute told reporters that the future development of China's textile industry still has room for optimization.

The majority of SMEs in the textile industry are in the critical period of sprinting to build a strong textile country. Today, with the increasing pressure of economic downfall, we hope that the state can accurately support key areas such as technological innovation and intelligent manufacturing through fiscal and taxation measures.

For example, we should further increase the deduction ratio of R & D, advertising and other expenses, and include technical pformation investment, product development cost and so on.

At the same time, the textile industry is the livelihood industry, the whole industry chain can accommodate 20 million of the employment. The China Textile Federation Industrial Economics Research Institute recommends that the state further introduce measures to appropriately reduce the tax or social security burden of labor-intensive industries.

For example, enterprises that make great contributions to employment and taxation can return tax according to the proportion of enterprises' actual payment of social security.

From all walks of life, the impression of the textile and garment industry has been locked in the "low-end industry" for a long time, which is also a major worry for the textile industry.

Some commercial banks still regard the textile industry as a "restricted development category". The repayment period is very short, and long term loans for investment are basically unavailable. Many textile enterprises still face financing difficulties and financing problems.

After 40 years of reform and opening up, China's textile industry has changed its appearance.

Yesterday's labor-intensive industries had a new label of "technology, fashion and green" today.

In the future, between growth and "growing pains", between the "big" and "strong" new and old kinetic energy pformation, the Republic of China's textile industry "veterans" still have many new stories to write about.