Bangladesh-Japan mulling FTA; apparel exports stagnant in recent years

Bangladesh’s exports to Japan recovered in 2021 to reach $1.165 billion from $1.033 billion in 2020. They amounted to $1.167 billion in 2019. In the first 10 months of 2022, the exports have crossed $1.126 billion, as per the date obtained from Fibre2Fashion’s market insight tool TexPro. 

Bangladesh has emerged as a prominent apparel manufacturing hub in the recent years, but it could not penetrate Japan which is a sophisticated market that stresses upon the quality and designs of the items. The exports could only inch up from $1.122 billion in 2018 to $1.165 billion in 2021. 

Bangladesh’s share in the total apparel imports of Japan was less than 5 per cent at $23.804 billion in 2021. Japan is heavily dependent on China for apparel supply. It imported apparel worth $13.878 billion in 2021 which was 58.30 per cent of Japan’s total imports, as per TexPro.

ALCHEMPro News Desk (KUL)