THREE major constraints – non-availability of money, power and gas supply, factories housed in shared and converted buildings, refusal of western buyers’ order due to safety concerns have made the apparel sector’s owners worried about uncertainty of jobs of about a million apparel workers in 1000 factories across the country, as a media outlet reported on Saturday. If the situation persists, the owners would be forced to shut down most of the small and medium factories resulting in the country’s economy to face a slowdown.Bangladesh has tremendous potential to be the world leader of textile and apparel export as garment exports rose to a record high in the immediate past fiscal year; but the persistent low price offers from foreign buyers are paring down profits of local entrepreneurs because of global recession. Besides the brunt of global crisis, they bear a 20 percent higher cost of doing business. Erratic gas and power supply, high freight charges – local and international – yarn price hike, implementation of workers’ minimum wages, higher cost of transportation and weak infrastructures have raised the cost of business. Some apparel makers also blame the poor negotiation skills for lagging in realizing a better price for their products from international buyers. Besides, the non-inclusion of Bangladesh in the new GSP-eligible country list is a testament to the problems that the country’s manufacturing sector confronts. Many of the conditions laid out by the US administration when it revoked the GSP facility for Bangladesh in 2013 were related to the garment sector. These constrictions of the apparel sector have increased due to the embargo of two countries – UK and Australia upon air cargo flights in this year and last year respectively. Signatory buyers beyond these two countries are not giving orders due to lack of fixing safety issues as some of the factory owners said. Reports said that business uncertainties facing apparel factories could cost the jobs of 1.2 million workers as it would be difficult to provide them alternative employment.Experts said that unless the government provided policy support, it would be difficult to address the issues of thousands of workers whose factories were facing closures leaving huge liabilities. If proper law reforms, strategies and planning are adopted, the country will certainly set a new dimension in global textile and apparel market in this clumsy environment of business. The industry also needs state of the art machinery and technology to be at par with the global competition. The government claims to be a government of development. So it is of no use for us to say that the government should create proper atmosphere for business.
