Country’s export earnings soared by 18.65 per cent year-on-year in July-October in the current fiscal year as the earnings hit an all-time single-month high in October due to a surge in readymade garment shipment amid the ongoing US-China trade war.The expo rt earnings in July-October of the financial year of 2018-19 grew to $13.65 billion from $11.50 billion in the same period of last financial year of 2017-18.
In October this year, the earnings stood at $3.71 billion, up 30.53 per cent on $2.84 billion posted in the same month of last year, according to the Export Promotion Bureau data released on Tuesday.
The previous single-month highest export was in August, 2017 when the figure was $3.64 billion.
Experts and exporters attributed the export jump to a number of reasons including seasonal global demand and orders shifting to Bangladesh amid the ongoing US-China trade dispute.
‘Bangladesh shipped an increased volume of RMG products in the month of October as it was the prime time for shipping garment products for spring and summer seasons. The products will hit the retail stores in Europe and the US in February next year. At the same time, we are getting advantage of China shift due to US-China trade war,’ Faruque Hassan, senior vice-president of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, told New Age on Tuesday.
He said that Bangladesh was also getting benefits of RMG factory remediation as the present state of workplace safety raised the confidence of global buyers on the Bangladeshi units.
Faruque said that Bangladeshi RMG products were doing not only in the traditional markets but also in the nontraditional markets and product diversification within the RMG sector was taking place.
The EPB data showed that earnings from RMG export in July-October of FY19 grew by 20.08 per cent to $11.33 billion compared with that of $9.43 billion posted in the same period of FY18.
Policy Research Institute executive director Ahsan H Mansur said it was a positive thing that country’s export earnings achieved impressive growth in last two months.
He said that it could be the reflection of ‘Shifting China’ due to the trade war between US and China.
‘We need to understand who the growth will be sustainable and why the sustainable growth is important,’ Mansur said.
Export earnings from the woven in the four months of FY19 grew by 22.61 per cent to $5.45 billion from $4.45 billion in the same period of FY18.
Earnings from knitwear export increased by 17.83 per cent to $5.87 billion from $4.98 billion and that from home textiles rose by 3.37 per cent to $269.57 million from $260.79 million.
EPB is optimistic about the export earnings’ chances of hitting $60-billion mark by 2021 as the global buyers are shifting their orders from China to Bangladesh amid the US-China trade war.
An EPB official said that Bangladesh’s export volume would increase more in the coming months as the global buyers were looking for alternative sourcing destinations.
The EPB data showed that export earnings from jute and jute goods in July-October of FY19 fell by 16.28 per cent to $288.85 million from $345.01 million in the same period of FY18.
Export of agriculture products in the four months of FY19 grew by 80.37 per cent to $366.53 million from $203.21 million in the same period of last fiscal year.
The EPB data showed that exports of leather and leather products fell by 19.43 per cent to $345.20 million from $428.44 million.
Export earnings from leather-footwear export increased by 6.90 per cent to $216.16 million while leather products fetched $72.29 million with a 56.69-per cent negative growth in the period.
According to the EPB data, export earnings from engineering products in the four months of FY19 grew by 12.48 per cent to $108.32 million from $96.30 million in the same period of the previous fiscal year.
Exports of frozen food and fish in July-October of FY19 fell by 13.04 per cent to $197.31 million from $226.91 million in the same period of FY18.
Source: New Age.
