According to the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS), Pakistan’s textile and clothing exports posted impressive growth in the first two months of this year, increasing by 28.67% to $2.93 billion compared to $2.28bn last year.
The PBS data showed ready-made garments exports jumped by 22.57% in value and quantity by 21.63% during July-Aug FY22. At the same time, the knitwear goods reached 34.12% in value and 14.22% in quantity, bedwear exports increased to 24.50 and 23.06% in value and quantity, respectively. The overall country’s exports posted a growth of over 27.98% year-on-year to $4.587bn in July-Aug FY22 compared to $3.584bn in the corresponding period last year.
Despite last year’s chaos due to the shortage of cotton, Pakistan’s cotton yarn exports were 32,880 MT in August 2021. The amount of cotton yarn export is enormous in terms of quantity. However, if the yarns had been utilized within the country, value-added products could have fetched more profit than the export of only raw cotton yarns. Therefore, Pakistan had to import cotton to fulfill the gap. According to PBS, the cotton import was 41,974 MT in August 2020, which increased to 53,238 MT in August 2021. The import of synthetic fibers reduced, which is a good sign. In August 2020, Pakistan imported 41,869 MT of synthetic fibers, which reduced to 37,781 MT in August 2021. The towel exports reached 16,920 MT in the previous month, which was 12,794 MT last year.
