COIMBATORE: The apparel sector in Tirupur is in for better times as pouring work orders from both domestic and international markets has impressed upon a majority of migrant workers to stay back from going to their hometowns this Deepavali. It used to be an annual phenomenon for migrant workers to leave the textile hub of Tirupur at this time of the year. They would also take longer to return and perhaps their extended holiday would take a toll on apparel production. But this year remains an exception. “A majority of migrant workers arrived in Tirupur only a few months ago as the apparel sector limped back to normalcy, after several years of staggered growth due to poor demand from the market. So, there is no major desertion by the migrant workforce, and they continue to stay here due to continuous work availability,” said Kumar Duraiswamy, Joint Secretary of Tiruppur Exporters Association. Similarly, workers from Southern districts who left for the festival have also started to return to work with the apparel sector resuming brisk production. “Apparel units have begun to function with around 40 per cent of the workforce on Monday after the holiday weekend. In another couple of days, the units will start to function to their full capacity with the entire fleet of workforce,” he added Industrialists claimed that both the domestic and export markets are going well after years of COVID-19 impact. “The political unrest in Bangladesh has turned the attention of European countries towards the textile sector in Tirupur. Also, the industries in Tirupur are embracing the latest technology through automation of machinery, while catering to the latest requirements. The apparel sector has registered an impressive growth of 17.5 per cent in US Dollars from September 2023 to September 2024,” claimed industrialists. For Tirupur, the domestic trade value is around Rs 25,000 crore, while exports hovers around Rs 33,000 to 35,000 crore. Echoing a similar view, MP Muthurathinam, president of Tirupur Exporters and Manufacturers Association (TEAMA) said the business volume for Deepavali was better this year as compared to previous years. “There is no issue of labour crunch now as a majority of workers have stayed back in Tirupur. Yet, production has not rebounded to its usual self unlike a few years ago. While bigger firms are functional, the smaller units have slowed down in production. Even the existing workers are sufficient to run the operations,” he said. Tirupur churns out over 50 per cent of knitwear garments in India, while employing more than six lakh labourers directly and another four lakh workers indirectly. Of them, a majority of workers are migrants from states like Bihar, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh.
Source: Dt Next
Synopsis The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has introduced monetary limits for waiving or reducing interest on tax payments. This move aims to streamline the process and provide relief to taxpayers facing genuine hardships, while also including safeguards to minimize misuse. The central board of direct taxes (CBDT) has set monetary limitations for waiver or Reduction of Interest on Tax Payments with riders. According to the circular issued late night Monday, principal chief commissioners of Income Tax can waive up to Rs. 50 lakhs, chief commissioners or director generals of Income Tax can waive between Rs. 50 lakhs and Rs. 1.5 crores, and principal chief commissioners of Income Tax can waive interest above Rs. 1.5 crores.
Source: Economic Times
The Indian rupee remains among the best emerging market bets to ride out volatility from the closely contested US presidential election, supported by a central bank prepared to defend the currency with the world’s fourth-largest reserve pile. Traders have ramped up their search for havens, analyzing latest polling data that shows no clear leader in the race between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump before Tuesday’s vote. The uncertainty has pushed up the cost of hedging dollar movements over the next week to its highest levels since early 2020. The Reserve Bank of India’s near-record foreign exchange reserves have helped it maintain control over the rupee, making it less vulnerable to US election-related swings. Unlike many of its peers, the rupee is less susceptible to shifts in US tariff policies, given India’s domestic-oriented economy, according to MUFG Bank. “The RBI remains strongly in the market to cap FX volatility and FX reserves are more than adequate,” said Michael Wan, senior currency analyst at MUFG Bank. Also, India’s “macro stability remains quite strong, with a manageable current account deficit of slightly more than 1 per cent of GDP and gradually moderating inflation pressures,” he said. RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das has stressed the importance of building foreign exchange reserves to shield the economy from volatility. He hasn’t hesitated from using the pile to prevent a sharp fall in the currency, especially around the 84 to a dollar mark. The central bank likely sold $10.8 billion in the three weeks to Oct. 25 to defend the rupee, as per Bloomberg Economics calculations. The rupee hit a record low of 84.1087 on Monday amid continued outflows from the nation’s equities.
The dollar-rupee’s 1-week implied volatility stood at 3.5250 per cent, versus 20.3 per cent for the dollar-Korean won, and 12.8 per cent for dollar/rupiah, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The Mexican peso, often considered an emerging market bellwether to US polls, has seen volatility surge to a four-year high.
Source: Business Standard
India is overhauling the way it forecasts electricity demand to ensure generation capacity matches what’s needed, and the grid remains stable with increasing volumes of clean energy. The government’s Central Electricity Authority, or CEA, is seeking cooperation with weather agencies to access better environmental data and plans more frequent forecasts to account for unexpected events, said Ghanshyam Prasad, the chairperson of the planning body. “We had been doing detailed demand assessment every five years, which we now plan to do every two years and eventually make it an annual exercise,” he said in an interview at his office in New Delhi. Changing power usage patterns, rising use of intermittent solar and wind energy and increasingly frequent extreme weather events have complicated demand forecasting, requiring systemic reforms. Gauging future demand more precisely has become imperative to prevent supply-demand mismatches, keep costs in check for utilities and prevent blackouts. Demand assessments at a national level are based on aggregation from state distribution utilities, since more than 80 per cent of the country’s electricity is traded through them. But state utilities still follow archaic modeling methods, said Hitesh Chaniyara, partner for climate and energy at PwC India. These power retailers lack historic datasets, weather studies, technology and skilled personnel, often relying on “spreadsheets and gut feeling” to plot future demand, he said. “That’s not going to work anymore,” Chaniyara said. “We can get national-level demand forecasts right only if state utilities are able to measure their own demand more accurately.” As climate change makes the weather more erratic, access to more granular long and short-term data is now crucial to estimating power demand, CEA’s Prasad said. The planning agency is seeking longer-term climate projections from the India Meteorological Department to upgrade its models. It is also looking for more location-specific weather data to be recorded multiple times in a day, Parasad said. Renewable energy is influenced by weather variability, and one storm has the potential to take a plant off the grid entirely, a void that must be filled by other sources until it’s put back up.
“We have asked all renewables companies to share the weather data they generate at their plant sites with the IMD, and most have started doing that,” Prasad said. “We are hoping IMD can process all that information and give us more granular forecasts.”
Source: Business Standard
The incremental credit-deposit (CD) ratio of the banking system has moderated to 77.7 per cent — lowest in nearly 30 months — as bank credit growth slowed down to 11.5 per cent in the fortnight ended October 18 and deposit growth outpaced credit growth at 11.7 per cent, according to Motilal Oswal’s research report. In the meantime, outstanding CD ratio has moderated to 79 per cent from 80.3 per cent in March 2024. “This decline may appear small; however, it needs to be seen in the context of rising CD ratio at most PSU banks, thus implying faster restoration of skewed CD ratio at private banks,” the research report said. The latest data from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) shows that after nearly 30 months, banks’ deposit growth has edged above credit expansion, potentially signalling an end to a period when the reverse was happening. Deposits in banks grew 11.74 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) during the fortnight ended October 18 to Rs 218.07 trillion while credit growth during the same period came in at 11.52 per cent to Rs 172.38 trillion. “We note that the deceleration in credit growth was sharper than we thought, partly driven by the weakness in the credit environment (mainly unsecured loans), besides elevated CD ratio,” an analyst at Motilal Oswal said, adding that there is a downside risk to the FY25 credit growth estimate of 12.5 per cent and credit growth can drift down toward 10.5 per cent Y-o-Y. Industry experts suggested that with HDFC Bank slowing its credit growth to bring down its elevated CD ratio, loan expansion is bound to lose pace. HDFC Bank has indicated that it will grow its loan book slower than the industry in FY25. The move comes as the lender looks to bring down its elevated CD ratio to pre-merger levels. Credit growth exceeded deposit growth since the fortnight ended March 25, 2022, leading to a widening gap that reached as much as 700 basis points (bps). The challenge of deposit mobilisation for banks has been intensified by the upward trend in equity markets, which has attracted more household savings than lenders. After Covid-19, households have increasingly shifted their investment to equities, directly as well as through mutual funds (MFs), at the expense of banks. This resulted in the RBI directing banks to adopt innovative ways to attract more deposits so that the elevated CD ratio of the system comes down. In the second quarter, deposit growth in private sector banks outpaced their credit growth. However, for state-owned banks (10 of the 12) that have announced their earnings, deposit growth has been slower than credit growth.
Source: Business Standard
The rupee fell to a new low of 84.12 a dollar on Monday as foreign investors sold domestic equities offsetting the strength in Asian peers, said dealers. Market participants said the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) intervened in the foreign exchange market via dollar sales to protect the rupee from further depreciation. The local currency had settled at 84.09 on Thursday after hitting an intra-day low of 84.12. The rise in crude oil prices further weighed on the rupee. Brent crude oil prices rose 1.5 per cent to $74.11 per barrel after Opec+ (the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries plus) announced a delay in its planned December production increase, pushing it back by at least a month due to price pressures from subdued demand. Over the past two years, Opec+ has cut production by nearly 6 million barrels per day to stabilise prices. Additionally, a weaker dollar and expectations of stimulus measures in China contributed to the recent price uptick. “The rupee fell because of outflows and a rise in crude oil prices. The American election is also a concern now,” said a dealer at a state-owned bank. “The RBI was there in the market when the rupee was at around 84.12,” he added. Asian currencies strengthened as the US dollar index fell to 103.77, against 103.95 on Friday. With just one day before the US elections, analysts suggest Donald Trump’s policies could increase inflation, bond yields, and the dollar, while Kamala Harris is seen as the candidate for continuity. Harris’s unexpected three-point lead in Iowa has contributed to the dollar’s dip amid a closely contested race. Additionally, the US Federal Reserve is expected to cut rates by 25 basis points on November 7.
Source: Business Standard
Home textiles are evolving, with key trends emphasizing sustainability, personalization, smart textiles, performance, vibrant designs and other attributes. Consumers increasingly seek eco-friendly materials, customizable options and comfort innovations. Bold colors and unique patterns are also gaining popularity.
Birla Excel, the lyocell fiber created by India-based man-made cellulosic fiber (MMCF) manufacturer Birla Cellulose, is at the forefront of these home textile trends, offering sustainable fibers made from eco-friendly materials. Their versatile fibers can be dyed in a wide range of vibrant colors, meeting varied consumer demands aesthetics. Designed for durability and comfort, these textiles enhance both functionality and aesthetic appeal. With advanced technology integrated into production, Birla Excel provides brands with high-quality, sustainable solutions, helping them stay competitive in a rapidly changing market. Of course, bedding designs must feel and perform as good as they look, and Birla Excel home textiles have numerous benefits, especially as they pertain to sleep comfort. Home textiles made with enhanced Birla Excel fiber improve sleep comfort by promoting airflow. The luxurious softness also offers a gentle touch against the skin, while effective moisture-wicking keeps sleepers relatively dry throughout the night. Durable and soft, these fabrics maintain their quality and create an enhanced sleeping environment. Birla Cellulose Amps Up Sustainable Innovations with Intellicolor, EcoSoft and SaFR
Birla Excel products come in various compositions, available in 100 percent versions or blended with other fibers like cotton and polyester, wool, jute, linen, etc across different product categories. The choice of composition depends on factors such as the product’s optimal performance and aesthetics, including hand feel and pricing. While Birla Excel is generally more affordable than other natural fibers, the desired product outcome ultimately influences the blend ratio in the final product. Additionally, made from eco-friendly natural sources, Birla Excel products provide peace of mind, making them an excellent choice for those prioritizing comfort and sustainability in their daily use.
Traceability and sustainability
Brands are more concerned about traceability these days, as are many consumers, and Birla is dedicated to achieving the highest level of sustainability transparency to provide assurance. Available on demand, the company has established an independent blockchain platform that provides complete traceability of the Excel Fiber used in its home textile products. Each fiber is embedded with a unique molecular tracer during production, enabling genuine and transparent sharing of information about its lifecycle. This tracer can only be identified by Birla’s advanced laboratories in India and China, effectively eliminating the possibility of counterfeit certifications. Notably, the tracer remains detectable in the final product even after multiple washes, ensuring a long-lasting solution for consumers and reinforcing trust in home textiles made with Birla Excel. It’s also important to look at the end of life of an item when considering its sustainability, and home textiles made with Birla Excel have several advantages. For example, home textiles made with Birla Excel are designed to be biodegradable, which helps reduce environmental impact after disposal. The fibers can also be recycled, allowing consumers to contribute to a circular economy and minimize waste. Birla Excel textiles are made from eco-friendly materials, promoting responsible sourcing throughout their lifecycle. The production processes also tend to have a lower carbon footprint with negligible emissions, enhancing their overall environmental sustainability. Furthermore, the sustainable practices associated with Birla Excel fibers often involve reduced water consumption, making them a more environmentally friendly choice from production to disposal. Together, these end-of-life advantages make Birla Excel home textiles a responsible option for consumers looking to lessen their ecological footprint. Home textile products crafted from Birla Excel exhibit substantially higher strength than traditional cotton products, owing to their high tenacity in both dry and wet conditions. This durability not only extends the lifespan of the products but also preserves their vibrant color brightness, contrast, and sheen.
Source: Sourcing Journal
October witnessed a sustained but marginal improvement in the health of the manufacturing sector in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region, according to S&P Global Ratings. A fresh rise in output was recorded following the first fall in three years in September. Meanwhile, demand trends improved for an eighth successive month in the region, but at the weakest pace during this growth sequence. Job creation halted in October following a fractional uptick in the month prior, and purchasing activity contracted for the first time in a year, S&P Global said in a release. The headline S&P Global ASEAN manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) held steady at 50.5 in October, unchanged from September, indicating the joint-weakest improvement in manufacturing conditions since February. Although demand trends showed signs of improvement at the beginning of the final quarter, they experienced a cooling for the third consecutive month, resulting in only a slight uptick—the weakest in the current eight-month growth sequence. Goods producers across ASEAN adjusted their buying activity and workforce numbers accordingly, with the former recording a drop for the first time in 12 months. As has been the case since March, ASEAN manufacturers reported an increase in backlogs in October, indicating rising pressure on manufacturing capacity. However, ongoing improvements in demand conditions enabled manufacturers to increase their output in the month. The respective seasonally adjusted index shifted into expansion territory after posting its first sub-50 reading in three years in September. In October, ASEAN manufacturers continued their destocking efforts, depleting both pre- and postproduction inventories for the fourth and eighteenth consecutive month respectively. Cost pressures simmered down, with input prices rising at the slowest pace in 15 months. Additionally, manufacturers raised their output prices at a modest pace, an S&P Global release said.
Expectations for output remained positive across the ASEAN manufacturing sector. However, growth projections were downgraded as optimism dipped to a four-month low, continuing a trend of weaker expectations compared to the historical average since November 2022.
Source: S&P Global
Functional, reliable and innovative – this is how the products for the contract sector are presented at Heimtextil in Frankfurt from 14 to 17 January 2025. Interior designers, architects and hospitality experts awaits a broad and international range of textiles, specifically for use in public buildings and facilities. From 14 to 17 January 2025, Heimtextil will be the first stop for architects, interior designers and hospitality experts looking for contract textiles. Here, they find the entire spectrum of textile furnishings in one place and at the same time an informative comprehensive programme, design and trend inspiration. Top international exhibitors and innovative newcomers present their latest products for the contract business. The entire textile spectrum is covered – from wallpapers, curtains and sun protection, upholstery and outdoor fabrics, bedding, bed linen, bathroom textiles, mattresses and sleeping systems, fibres and yarns to carpets.
'Contract textiles are the champions league of home textiles. They are subject to the highest demands in terms of quality, functionality, safety and design. Year after year, our exhibitors outdo themselves with innovative products and further developments in functionality. This makes it all the more important to stay up to date, discover the most promising innovations and explore the new possibilities’, explains Bettina Bär, director Heimtextil.
Source: Heimtextil.com
In the third quarter of 2024, the order index for Italian textile machinery, as reported by the Economics Department of the Association of Italian Textile Machinery Manufacturers (ACIMIT), showed a decline compared to the period July - September 2023 (-19%). In value terms, the index stood at 50.6 points (base 2021=100). This drop is due to the decrease in foreign markets (-23%), which account for 86% of total orders. Instead, a 15% increase was observed in Italy compared to the third quarter of 2023. The absolute index value for foreign markets was 49.1 points, while in Italy it reached 61 points. In the third quarter, the order backlog amounted to 3.8 months of guaranteed production. Marco Salvadè, President of ACIMIT, commented: “The order index remains at low levels. The foreign demand is of greatest concern. Investments in machinery remain stalled in some of the major markets for Italian textile machinery, such as India, Turkey, and Bangladesh.” “The growth in order collection in the domestic market is not sufficient to bridge the gap recorded abroad. Furthermore, the increase needs to be compared with the same quarter in the previous year, when orders were already low. Given the weak demand in several key markets, Italian manufacturers are working to seek new opportunities in countries where the textile industry is still technologically underdeveloped,” added Salvadè. “Recently, ACIMIT organized exploratory missions to Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan to assess the local textile market and understand the technological needs of its companies.”
Source: Knitting Industry
Prices of imported and exported goods were 3.8 percent lower (for exports) and 5.5 percent lower (for imports) in the first half of 2024 than in the same period of 2023. Following a period of sharply rising prices that began in mid-2021, prices have been falling again since the second quarter of 2023. According to figures on the international goods trade (based on goods crossing borders), prices continued to drop into the first half of 2024, but the rate of that decrease was less rapid in the second quarter than in the first. Statistics Netherlands (CBS) reports this on the basis of the latest figures.
The figures cited in this article are preliminary. Due to differences in methodology and in the concept of international trade, they diverge from CBS’s existing deflators of international trade (based on change of ownership). The drop in the volume of trade (the amount of goods imported and exported), which began in Q2 2023, also persisted into Q1 2024. The volume of goods exported increased slightly in Q2 2023, year on year, while the volume of goods imported decreased slightly. The drop in the volume of exports over the first half of 2024 was 0.3 percent; for imports, the drop was 2.5 percent. This means that in the first two quarters of 2024, the total value of the trade in goods was down (for both imports and exports and taking account of both volume and price levels).
Source: cbs.nl
A well-known Chinese company, Xingchen Textile Co Ltd, has formally agreed to invest US $ 35.03 million to build a textile recycling facility in the Mongla Export Processing Zone (EPZ). The agreement, which was signed with the Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority (Bepza) on Sunday, intends to support the regional textile sector by implementing environmentally friendly recycling techniques. By recycling discarded fabric from garment factories, known as “jhut” in Bangladesh, the new factory is anticipated to generate 20,000 tonnes of yarn and 12,000 tonnes of woven fabrics yearly. Additionally, the project is expected to give local workers about 600 new job opportunities. During a ceremony at the Bepza Complex in Dhaka, Chen Dehong, chairman of Xingchen, and Md Ashraful Kabir, member (investment promotion) of Bepza, signed the agreement. Bepza’s executive chairman, Maj Gen Abul Kalam Mohammad Ziaur Rahman, was present at the event. Xingchen is the second Chinese investor to build a textile recycling facility in the Mongla EPZ, and this investment represents a major step in encouraging eco-friendly practices in the textile industry.
Source: Apparel Resource
Turkish manufacturers continued to face a challenging environment as the final quarter of the year got under way, although rates of moderation in output, new orders, purchasing activity and employment softened since September, according to S&P Global Ratings. Stocks of purchases, meanwhile, were scaled back to the largest extent in almost four-and-a-half years. On the price front, both input costs and output prices rose at softer rates. The headline Istanbul Chamber of Industry Turkiye manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) posted 45.8 in October, up from 44.3 in September, but still below the 50 no-change mark, and therefore, signalling a moderation of business conditions during the month. The health of the Turkish manufacturing sector has eased in each survey period since April. Market conditions remained challenging, leading to muted demand and further slowdowns in total new orders and exports. In turn, manufacturers scaled back production for the seventh month running. In all cases, however, rates of moderation softened from September. Employment and purchasing activity were also scaled back in response to muted new orders, although in some cases firms reported that voluntary resignations had caused a drop in staffing levels, an S&P Global release said.
Meanwhile, stocks of purchases decreased to the largest extent since May 2020.
Inflationary pressures continued to soften at the beginning of October. Input costs rose markedly, but at the softest pace for almost a year-and-a-half. The pace of output price inflation also eased. Suppliers' delivery times in Turkiye lengthened in October following a first improvement in vendor performance for nine months during September. However, latest data signalled only a modest lengthening of lead times.
Source: Bne IntelliNews
