Interviewed By Sumaiya Siddique, MBR Team

MBR: Our local textile industry has shown reluctance to get adapt to the modern machinery. Instead, The millers are more comfortable with age-old machines imported from China, Korea, Japan, etc. Will you help us to understand why?

Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun: Inadequate investment is one of the hindrances that act behind being unable to use modern technology. Local Textile industry
needs heavy investment in machineries as it is a capital intensive industry but we have lacking of such investments. As a consequence, the factories are unable to upgrade them and fails to embrace the modern technology. One of our neighboring country, India has a special program, called Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme, under this program, funds are allocated to the development of the textile industry in such a way, so that they can get adapt to
modern technology easily. We also need such programs to be able to get adapted to modern machineries.

MBR: Although skilled workers are the precondition for the sustainability of an industry, our local textile industry lacks it and there is no major initiative to improve it in the RMG sector. Why don’t we see such initiative for the industry?

Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun: There are some skill development programs on going but we need more. There is a program run by an international development finance institution under the ministry of finance called Skill for Employment Investment (SEIP) which aims to develop the skill of the workers but the main problem is that our local textile industry is still unorganized and so, the concerned entities are yet to be aware of such development programs run by the government. In this situation, a proper circulation of such initiatives will help us to overcome the obstacle.

MBR: The local textile industry of our neighboring countries not only fulfill most of their local demand but also has their presence in the international market; for example: Arvind and Raymond. Why don’t we have such brands with both local and international presence?

Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun: In order to make the presence of our local textile both in domestic and international market, we need to reform some of our policies. For an example, for a textile company to be 100% export oriented company, they need to export 80% of their production which is a difficult threshold to be met. If such policies are relaxed, our local textiles will be in a better position to make its presence both in domestic and international
market.

MBR: Once we had world recognized fabric: Jamdani and Muslin but with time, but at present, fabric processors try to emulate the
design of neighboring countries and there is no significant R&D as well in this sector. What are the reasons that have created such a situation?

Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun: Our Jamdani still has a very bold presence across the world. Certainly, as time passes by and with the up-gradation of the technology, the lifestyle of the people has changed and we can see a diverse array of products in the market now. Our traditional jamdani is prepared by remote weavers and they also need proper technological up-gradation. If we can create a specialized program for jamdani, it will create a bolder presence in the globe.

MBR: Our local textile mostly focuses on  women wear and traditional men wear, but it lacks initiative from our millers to produce formal/semi-formal male wear: denim, gabardine, shirting and panting fabric. Will you please share with us why our investors are reluctant to invest this sector?

Mr. Abdullah Al Mamun: Although in the past, our local textile industry focused on womenswear and a few traditional male-wear, at present, local brands are making their presence in the male formal/semi-formal wear. We are also very optimistic that in the next few years, we will cater our local market which is around USD 7 billion dollar and it will be a matter of great pride for us.