According to China's cotton data, in September 2012, China imported 137,624 tons of cotton yarn, up 62.29% year-on-year; export cotton yarn was 35.22 million tons, up 52.33% year-on-year. According to the historical data released by the General Administration of Customs, from January to June 2012, China's cumulative imports of cotton yarn was 661,300 tons, an increase of 63.24%; the cumulative export of cotton yarn was 225,500 tons, a year-on-year decrease of 2.97%. In September 2012, cotton yarn imports were still at a high level, while exports were significantly higher than the previous year. It can be seen from the data that the international advantages of China's cotton yarn are gradually being lost.
Price upside down
“China has lost its price advantage in low-end cotton textile products.” A person in charge of Shanghai Xinlian Textile Import & Export Co., Ltd. said that India, Pakistan, Vietnam and other countries rely on lower cotton yarn prices and labor cost advantages. It has squeezed part of our market share in the United States. Even a large American T-shirt company has set up factories in Bangladesh and South America, and then exports the products to China.
According to industry insiders, at present, due to the serious upside down of cotton prices at home and abroad, international cotton prices are much lower than domestic cotton prices, and the production costs of enterprises are too high, but the price of product terminals is relatively lagging behind. According to the reporter's understanding, the current price difference between domestic and foreign cotton is about 4,000 yuan to 5,000 yuan. In addition, the slowdown in downstream demand is also one of the reasons why cotton companies are hard to change.
According to the latest data from the General Administration of Customs, from January to October this year, the total export of textile yarns, fabrics and products was about 8.05 billion US dollars, a slight increase of 1% compared with the same period, while the total export of clothing and clothing accessories was about 14.7 billion US dollars, only up 2.6. %, the growth rate has slowed down noticeably. For cotton textile enterprises, the export of products is its main business. From the downstream of the industrial chain, many domestic customers of cotton textile enterprises are garment manufacturers based on export business.
According to the latest data, due to the continued sluggish international market, China's textile and apparel exports totaled US$192.6 billion from January to September, a year-on-year increase of only 1.04%. As an intermediate link, the upstream of textile enterprises is cotton, and the downstream is clothing, fabric toys and shoes and hats. Due to the high upstream cotton prices and the light downstream exports, textile companies have limited production in the unprofitable reality.
Identify your strengths
According to the latest data from the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Textiles, from January to September this year, the total export of textiles and clothing was US$187.1 billion, a slight increase of 0.53% year-on-year. Except for March, May and September, all other months showed negative growth. More than 40% of provinces' exports declined; more than half of exporters' exports declined. However, at this year's Canton Fair, the reporter found that the performance of some companies with a trend of transformation has seen a substantial increase.
Some enterprises said that compared with low-cost Southeast Asia, China's traditional manufacturing industry still has obvious advantages in terms of high quality and innovation capability. A person in charge of a fabric company in the south told reporters that although many companies currently choose low-priced imported cotton yarns for price considerations, due to the low import of cotton yarn, they cannot meet the needs of enterprises in terms of quality and grade. Moreover, imported cotton yarn can not owe money, which affects the financial flow of enterprises to a certain extent.
Yang Yongqing, chairman of Jiangsu Sumeda Textile International Trading Co., Ltd., said that Chinese companies with rising costs must play their own comparative advantages, such as building their own brands and upgrading their own industries. In this regard, Li Rongcan, Assistant Minister of Commerce, expressed his approval that Chinese enterprises should continue to transform and upgrade, develop and innovate, and increase the added value of products in order to adapt to the current new international competition.
Zhu Beina, president of the China Cotton Textile Industry Association, believes that despite the current problems, the prospects for the Chinese cotton textile industry are still good. "From the perspective of the future, the current difficulties are temporary. Because China has a relatively complete industrial chain, this is one of our greatest advantages, and China is the largest cotton producer with complete spinning and weaving. In addition to this, Zhu Beina encourages enterprises to increase the use of non-cotton fibers and increase the added value of products; relying on domestic demand to maintain growth, "we must further accelerate industrial transformation and upgrading." Zhu Beina Said.