China lacks joint ventures investments in Pak's textile sector: report

Highlighting that Pakistan has relevant endowments for a sustainable textile industry, a Pakistani media house has pointed out that China lacks interests in joint ventures or Greenfield investments in the country's textile sector.

The article published in the Express Tribune said Pakistan is even losing its market share to India and Vietnam in yarn exports to China.

In New Delhi's case, the report said that the China Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (CASME) officially launched on June 20 this year a textile-focused industrial park to be built near India's Ahmedabad city in Gujarat.

"Phase-I of this $1-billion industrial park is expected to be completed by the end of 2017. More than 100 Chinese enterprises have shown their willingness to invest in the park," it said.

Highlighting Beijing's investments in Vietnam, the article said that the country has become a hot investment destination for the Chinese textile companies, which are pouring millions of dollars for establishing manufacturing facilities there.

"Texhong, a large Chinese textile group, has four production bases in Vietnam, which are churning out 300,000 tons of textiles each year and make up 43 percent of its total production capacity," the article read.

It added that Chinese companies from textile power houses of Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces have already invested in Vietnam and are further expanding their capacities.

The article also emphasized that on overseas investments, Chinese textile industry are building dedicated industrial parks for investment as well as setting up factories in existing infrastructure in the host countries and Pakistan is missing on the Chinese radar from both the investment models.

Comparing China's annual textile exports which stand at $284 billion, a whopping 37 percent share in $766 billion worth of global textile trade, it said that Pakistan's textile export is of $13 billion and make up a paltry 1.7 percent of the global market.

"Ironically even now when China is moving out of the low value-added textiles, the advantage is not being taken by Pakistan, but other low-cost operators such as India, Bangladesh and Vietnam are picking up the slack," the article read.

Commenting on Pakistan's textile sector, the article said Islamabad is unable to compete with more efficient producers in the international markets.

"Pakistan is even losing its market share to India and Vietnam in yarn exports to China. It seems like Pakistani textile sector is unable to compete with more efficient producers in the international markets," it added.

The article said that Pakistani Government has been highlighting the potential of the country as a relocation base for Chinese textile enterprises but not much of this rhetoric is converting into reality.

"Numerous reasons like power shortage, high cost of business, security situation and so on could be mentioned for this below par performance of the textile industry. One can often read half a page or more so advertisements by local textile associations appealing to the government for some more concessions to save their ever-sinking ship," it said.