Vietnam will become the 10th largest garment exporter in the world by 2010, local newspaper Vietnam News on Wednesday quoted a top official of the country's biggest garment producer as saying. Vietnam, which was ranked the 16th out of 153 garment exporters worldwide last year, will advance in the Top Ten by 2010, predicted Le Quoc An, chairman of the management board of the Vietnam National Textile and Garment Group (Vinatex). The country reaped textile and garment export revenues of mor

India is looking into the UK proposal for India-EU free trade agreement,said Commerce Minister Kamal Nath. At a meeting with UK Trade Minister Ian Pearson, he said India was open to all the ideas that enhance its trade engagement. Nath also talked about the recognition of Indian medical, accountancy and law degrees in UK. On multilateral trade talks, both ministers highlighted the need for maintaining momentum gained at the Hong Kong WTO ministerial in negotiations to complete the Doha

Long known as Asia's shopping center for global brand names and luxury goods, Hong Kong now is promoting its own designers and trying to sell local brands to the world. On Tuesday, it launched a duet fashion exhibitions, Hong Kong Fashion Week for Fall/Winter 2006 and World Boutique, Hong Kong 2006, aimed at facilitating regional garments trades and establishing local brand names. "Hong Kong is not only one of the world's largest exporters of clothing and clothing accessories, but also t

New Delhi: After the quota regime, textile exports to the US and European Union has seen a significant growth as a result of which country抯 textile sector stands second after China. Ministry of Textiles said here on January 16. Further added that cotton textile and yarn products exports has been overtaken by home textiles and made ups segments. Since exports to US has increased by 30-35% its exports to EU has been increased by 20%. Indian apparel exports are estimated to increase to R

Output at U.S. textile plants increased by 2.1% from December 2004 to December 2005, the Fed said Tuesday. Meanwhile, production at apparel factories increased 0.9% year-over-year. It was the first time since 1996 that both textile and apparel production had increased in the same year. See full story. U.S. production jumped in the second half of 2005, after the U.S. government imposed "safeguard" limits on some Chinese textile imports. The United States and China reached a comprehensive ag

The Chinese Ministry of Commerce announced that it will levy anti-dumping tax starting from Monday on a chemical for making silicon polymer imported from Japan, the United States, Britain and Germany. According to a final ruling, importers of this chemical from the above four countries should pay anti-dumping tax in the coming five years with rates varying between 13 percent and 22 percent. The ruling of the Ministry says the four countries are unfairly selling the dimethyl cyclosiloxane

Macau Statistics and Census Service released the Tourist Price Index (TPI) for the fourth quarter of 2005. The TPI of Q4 was 111.43, up by 3.12 percent over the previous quarter. Due to higher prices in hotel accommodation, in jewellery that was influenced by rising gold prices, as well as in Winter clothing and footwear, indices of Accommodation; Miscellaneous goods; and Clothing and footwear rose by 10.91 percent, 6.26 percent and 2.26 percent respectively. On the other hand, Transport

Talks between Malta Enterprise and Gama Textile Group, which was interested in setting up shop in Malta, are likely to collapse. Negotiations with Gama Textile Group were declared after Denim Services Ltd said it would dismiss 800 workers and close down by the end of January. Gama was to employ 400 workers in a project for which the government was expected to grant ?.5 million in soft loans, with most of the employees coming from Denim Services. A spokesman for the Investments Ministry

The US is aggressively working through free trade negotiations with a number of countries and has just concluded a sixth round of talks with Thailand. South Korea is also keen to be added to the increasingly longer list of countries. However, the path from negotiating to implementation is often long and incorporates tight Rules of Origin for textile and apparel exporters. Free Trade Agreements or FTA's are tricky things requiring a whole range of meetings and negotiations between two or more

A loan commitment by the Japan Textile Federation could help revitalize Indonesia's ailing textile industry, as long as the government is willing to guarantee the loan, a local textile association says. The federation has expressed interest in helping Indonesian textile companies with newer generation spinning and weaving machinery, the Indonesian Textile Association (API) said. "We have filed a proposal for some US$3 billion worth of machinery and Japan has agreed as long as the government i