This document discusses problems facing Bangladesh's woven fabric industry. It finds that Bangladesh imports around 70% of woven fabrics while only producing 30% locally. Some key issues identified include: - Lack of dye manufacturing capabilities - High interest rates for loans - Need for improved fabric design and research facilities - Difficulties with woven fabric production processes requiring more space and power than knitting - Psychological issues like lack of confidence in producing new designs and a focus on high profits over innovation The document examines these problems in detail based on surveys of textile mills and industry experts. Addressing these challenges is needed to strengthen the local woven fabric sector.

2. Prepared By : Mazadul Hasan sheshir
ID: 2010000400008
13th Batch (session 2009-2013)
Department : Wet Processing Technology
Email: mazadulhasan@yahoo.com
Blog : www. Textilelab.blogspot.com (visit)
Southeast University
Department Of Textile Engineering
I/A 251,252 Tejgaon Dhaka Bangladesh
Prepared By :

3. Total Textile Process at a Glance

4. OUR MAIN PURPOSE IS TO FIND OUT WHY WE ARE
PRODUCING ONLY 30% WOVEN FABRIC WHILE IMPORT
AROUND 70% WOVEN FABRICS FROM ABROAD?

5. We the men of Bangladesh are inborn weavers. If we turn back near
future we can see that the local woven sector was very rich in product
mix. But in recent times with the gradual development in knit sector,
woven sector is day-by-day lagging behind. A matter of great sorrow that
we only produce 30% of export oriented woven fabrics fabric while we
import around 70% woven fabrics form abroad.
What are the problems? What are the burdens towards the
development of woven sector? We three friend tried our level best to
sort out those problems.
INTRODUCTION

6. Some of their findings are given below:
Must improve our dye-stuff manufacturing capability.
Our bank interest rate is highest among all competiting countries. So we
must have to reduce it.
 Must improve our fabric design and research facilities.
We may utilize other fibres like Bamboo, Hemp etc.
Installation of solar power needs financing.
Must improve woven dyeing as well as finishing capacity.
Must improve our production capability of synthetic fibres.
Finally quality of woven fabric should be improved.
LITERATURE SURVEY & SURVEY DATAS

7. At the very beginning of our thesis, we have done a survey work. We have visited
at least 5 big woven industries and some buying houses. We had met a number
of fabric suppliers and merchandisers. They had given us much information
according to our desire. List of factories are given below:
Beximco Textile Mills Limited.
Noman Weaving Mills Limited.
Zarba Textile Mills Limited.
Shabab Fabrics.
Unifill Group Limited.
Dewhirst Limited.
Noman Terry Limited.
EXPERIMENTAL & SURVEY DATAS

8. We have enlisted some important questions relevant to our topic before reaching
those textile mills and buying houses. The list of questions is given below:
What are the reasons behind less number of woven projects in Bangladesh?
What are the difficulties found in woven fabric production?
Why we are not able to ensure acceptable quality limit of woven fabric?
Which types of fabric we import from foreign countries, and what are the reasons we import it
rather than produce it locally?
Why we are not interested to produce variable types of woven fabrics?
Is there any problem in logistic supports associated with woven fabric production?
EXPERIMENTAL & SURVEY DATAS

9. PROBLEMS FOUND ABOUT WOVEN FABRIC PRODUCTION IN BANGLADESH
 PRESENT PROBLEMSGENERAL PROBLEMS
Investment Capability Power Consumption
Improper Utilization of Technical
Persons
Requirement of Space
Process Difficulty Buyer Recommendations
Environmental Policy Very Less Woven Dyeing Facility

10. PROBLEMS FOUND ABOUT WOVEN FABRIC PRODUCTION IN
BANGLADESH :
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEMS: OTHER REASONS:
Lack of confidence Horizontally Integration
High profit achieving tendency New Fabric Development
Vendor don’t want to take risk Machine Conditions
Factory Evaluation
Lack of Modern Design Machine
Lack of Government Patronizations

11. DESCRIPTION OF THE MAJOR PROBLEMS
 INVESTMENT CAPABILITY
Weak economic condition of Bangladesh
 Limited big investors with less interest to invest in big projects.
 In our country an investment of about 30-50 million is considered as very big
investment .
 In CHINA,INDIA,AUSTRALIA,PAKISTAN investment under 100 million is very
uncommon.
 In some cases new factory without 1000 looms is strictly prohibited.
 So they have very good scope to setup various types of looms.
 As a result they always get the big orders of bulk production.

12.  Most important factor for every sector in Bangladesh.
 In our country most of the Textile factory as well as Garments are running
without or with very small number of textile Specialist/ Technologist.
This is true for both management level as well as junior level.
In case of knit sector Bangladesh has already got huge experience in making
various types of knit fabric.
Because initially when this sector start to grow in Bangladesh, the foreign
buyers are starting to give order of varies product.
 Because they know the requirement & facilities to ensure the quality of knit
fabric can be easily achievable & the technology is not so difficult.
Improper Utilization of Technical Persons

13. NB: Total Export & Net Retention are in Million Dollars.
The record of order of knit garments is given below

14. Now if we focused on woven sector the case is different in comparison of knit
sector. A data to show the increasing rate of woven garments & knit garments
exporting rate is given below.
Improper Utilization of Technical Persons

15. If we saw the table we can see that in first moment from 1990 to 2002
the woven garments exporting amount is increasing consistently which
means consistent growth of woven fabric production locally.
But after a period of the increasing rate of local woven garments
production is very low or can say the growth rate is very slow.
To find out the reason why this happen we contact with BGMEA,BTMEA
some leading buying house & some experienced Merchandiser .
as the woven projects are very few in number and it is very time
consuming and difficult to make skilled manpower for woven factory, so
we only produce what we produce as usual.
Improper Utilization of Technical Persons

16. . They told us that,’’ For producing various types of quality woven fabric, we
don’t have enough expertise and we can’t make enough skilled manpower
timely.’’ For this reason the woven projects are not increasing gradually like
knit projects in Bangladesh.”
As the woven projects are very few in number and it is very time consuming
and difficult to make skilled manpower for woven factory, so we only produce
what we produce as usual.
. As the variation in production number of projects is very less, the textile
expertise of Bangladesh lost their interest to be a woven fabric expert and
thus the sector is going to the hand of non-tech people.
Improper Utilization of Technical Persons

17. Sequence of operation (Gray Woven Fabric)
Yarn from spinning(cone)
For warp Winding For weft
Warping Weft(cone)
Sizing
Drawing and denting Knotting
Looming
Weaving
Inspection
Folding
Packaging
PROCESS DIFFICULTY

18. Sequence of operation (Knitting):
Yarn in cone form
Feeding the yarn cone in the creel
Feeding the yarn in the feeder via positive feeding arrangement and tension device
Knitting
Withdraw the rolled fabric and weighting
Numbering
Inspection
Delivered to the garments
PROCESS DIFFICULTY

19. If we focus on these processes we can easily understand why woven fabric
production is difficult and why variations can’t be easily brought in woven
fabric in comparison with knit fabric.
PROCESS DIFFICULTY

20.  Buyer evaluates the factory by find out their environmental policies.
. Most of our factories have no any specific environmental policies, even
they have no any ETP.
. Factory owner’s main argument about ETP is that ETP running is very
costly and added extra value to the product.
Buyers also see where the factory is established, is it in a crowed ful area
or outside of the town, they also see how much impact of that factory to
the environment.
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY

21. A Data of Minimum Standard Requirements of factory environment which
proposed by an well reputed Buyer is given below:
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY

22. Power Consumption:
 No doubt it on off the major problems.
 Lack of resource and investment.
 Lack of maintenance of existing power plants.
 Many capable groups are waiting for power supply in their big projects,
those are already established, machines are available….but power supply is
nil!
 As we all know that before weaving, WARPING & SIZING is mandatory and it
consumes huge power than knit industry.
PRESENT PROBLEMS

23. A case study showed that a renowned woven factory named NOMAN
WEAVING MILL’S per month needed power is 3723 kw(for 128 looms).
While a renowned knitting factory named Mother Color having 128
circular knitting machines per month power consumption is only 768 kw.
So it is now clear that a huge power is needed to run a woven factory.
Power Consumption

24. 30 acr
Requirement of Space

26. 1 acre
Requirement of Space

27. A RECOMMENDATION LIST OF BUYER FOR WOVEN PRODUCTION:
Buyers Recommendation

28. Buyers Recommendation

29. Buyers Recommendation

30. .
Buyers Recommendation

31. Buyers Recommendation

32. LACK OF CONFIDENCE:
‘’ WHY WE ARE PRODUCING ONLY SOME COMMON FABRICS, WHY COULD
NOT WE PRODUCE OTHER DIFFICULT DESIGN FABRICS? WHERE MOST OF THE
CASES ALL FACILITIES ARE AVAILABLE!’’
Before answer that question we have to look after some facts:
99% of our woven factories have very less amount of TECHNICAL PERSONS!
Even those non-tech persons have gained the PRODUCTION MANAJER post!
When a buyer contact with that PRODUCTION MANAJER and then show his
fabric sample, which is very difficult to analyse and more difficult to produce.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM

33. That time He(PM) began to think about his factory pressure, by this time He
easily sort out that ‘’ HAY I HAVE ALREADY GOT ENOUGH ORDER OF NORMAL
BULK FABRIC PRODUCTION, WHY SHOUD I ACCEPT THAT DIFFICULT DESIGN
ORDER, WHICH ANALYSIS SHOULD BE TIME WASTING AND THE WHOLE
PROCESS OF PRODUCTION SHOULD BOTHER MY MIND A LOT!’’
Another fact tells that ‘’THIS TYPE OF RELAXED MENTALITY ‘’ didn’t grow in
a day..........it is the lack of inspiration to the manager from the superiors. As a
result day by day that person loses his attention towards doing some
innovative things.
These lead us to the unsatisfactory development.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM

34. HIGH PROFIT ACHIEVEING TENDENCY:
 This type of tendency has a great impact in our woven sector. A case
study tells that our factory owners always try to make minimum 200%
profit on every shipment/individual product.
 . To achieve high profit sometimes they apply illegal theory, for example
in sizing they use lower quality or lower cost chemical. Suppose a fabric
construction is 50*50/140*96=58’’ in that case total warp required is
8120 but they do it with 8000 ends. No problem they minimize the
problem in the section of finishing. So they saved 120 cones then
120*2.8=336 Dollar saved.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM

35. Here comes the matter of cost, in Bangladesh the cost of fabric is relatively high than other
fabric producing countries. Main reason is that we always import raw materials to
machines, these added huge value to the products. Here comes another fact that our
factory owners are not deep thinkers or having business related intelligence. They can’t
realize that if they consider the cost of these products they may get more orders, but it is a
matter of great sorrow that they can’t do this. In another case most of the time they follow
the international market price, for example 1 yds fabric price is 2.98 $, India that time
cleverly drop the rate in to 2.85$. Then again the Bangladeshi factory owners drop the rate.
Again India raises the price but that time Buyers think that India gives us better quality than
Bangladesh, then why should we drop the order in Bangladesh!
The average price of Bangladesh-made shirts was $62.74 per dozen in 1998. This price was
the second lowest. The Dominican Republic sold the lowest priced shirts of the same
category at $54.79 per dozen. Prices of Indian, Mexican and Sri Lankan shirts were $81.04,
$76.26 and $74.77 respectively. Against this, the prices of Hong Kong and Malaysia shirts
were $107.34 and $134.08 respectively. Exporters from Bangladesh produce mostly those
items on which quotas
are available.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM

36. VENDOR DO NOT WANT TO TAKE RISK :
From the above discussion already we have seen that in 95% cases we have got only
common fabric orders. Now-a-days it became more difficult for the Garments officials to
choose the fabric producing factories by their own because of buyer restriction. A case
study tells that; GAP the most famous buyer in the world. They ordered Ananta garments
to sort fabric from an Indian fabric producing factory. They did not prefer our Bangladeshi
factories.
Another fact is that Ananta garments are habituated to sort fabric from that Indian
reputed factory. Suppose after 5/6 years GAP permit them to sort fabric from anywhere,
that time Ananta garments official thinks that why should I sort fabric from other
factories while that Indian factory supplying our required fabric in a satisfactory way.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM

37. HORIZONTALLY INTEGRATION :
Most of the woven factories are horizontally integrated. It seems that they don’t have any spinning,
dyeing, printing, finishing, garments facilities under one specific shed. Most of them are very much
dependent on yarn supply. A matter of great sorrow that our yarn quality is not too good and cost is
comparatively higher than international market. As a result the fabric cost is become high.
NEW FABRIC DEVELOPMENT:
Very less amount of new fabric development according to buyer requirements, also we are not
capable of all sort of fabric development.
Own innovation is almost absent here.
Thus we can’t attract or assure the new buyers, those who want to drop their orders.
That’s why we always got the order of regular or normal fabric production.
Fabric developers are not interested to build up new fabric concept because there might not have
facilities to produce that sort of value added fabric.
Finally we always having same buyer same production
OTHER REASONS

38. MACHINE CONDITIONS:
Most of the machines of our factories are almost 5/10/15 years old. So when buyers come to an
audit in that mill they became demoralized.
Some of the factories are using end life Warping and Sizing machines thus the efficiency became less.
Most of machine having duplicate parts thus they losing their efficiency gradually.
Another case study said that in most of the factories the WARPERS & WEAVERS beams became ‘TAL’
that’s why warping and sizing became faulty.
FACTORY EVALUATION:
Unfair policies of big industries also responsible for this condition. A case study showed that big
industries when expand their plants, they easily get extra power because they are renowned while new
factories failed to achieve that.
Buyers mentality is also responsible, they always drop order to the renowned factories. While in
many places in our country produce quality fabrics. Another concept is that those less renowned
factories failed to prove themselves, they failed to catch buyer. They satisfied themselves by producing
only local fabric.
OTHER REASONS

39. LACK OF MODERN DESIGN MACHINE:
Our machines are capable of producing only normal design fabrics. So we can’t produce
difficult design fabric specially curtain fabric and heavy blankets. In winter major countries
a great demand of heavy blanket is seen. The absence of modern JACQUARD machine
caused a great misfortune to get those order.
LACK OF GOVERNMENT PETRONIZATIONS:
No doubt that woven sector is a promising sector in Bangladesh. It needs huge government
patronization, but the real scenario is totally different.
To import woven machinery and accessories, vendor doesn’t get any Tax holiday facilities. If
we focus India, China, Honkong, Thailand and other woven fabric producing countries, we
found that their producers have got huge facilities provided by their government. Facilities
are given below:
OTHER REASONS

40. Their government provided huge research facilities and they have got the
independence of making decisions.
They have got 100% tax free facilities for any kind of woven related import.
They have got uninterrupted power supply.
Their bank interest for this sector is almost 0-1%.
They have got huge technical persons as well as modern machineries.
They achieved ultra modern technologies by the shake of huge Textile related
institutes.
Now if we focus our Textile sector specially woven sector we are facing above
discussed laggings.
Now we are standing towards a great opportunity that is technical textiles. Its
application is gradually increasing day by day. An important fact is that 90% of
Technical textiles are made by woven fabrics. Now if we want to grab that
opportunity or catch the market we must have to improve our present condition
of woven sector.
OTHER REASONS

41. A consumption of technical textile is given below:
OTHER REASONS

42. 1. Establishment of Modern Woven Fabric Research Centre.
2. Special patronization of Government for the improvement of woven sector.
3. Encourage the local woven manufacturer to come into International Market.
4. Provide Special facilities in case of Power supply for woven sector.
5. Increase expert manpower for woven sector.
6. Try to produce Textile Machineries locally.
7. Establishment of active R&D Section in every woven factory.
THINKINGS

58. 1. Yarn Manufacturing Technology
Link : http://www.facebook.com/pages/Yarn-Manufacturing-
Technology/485014954866808
2. Fabric Manufacturing Technology
Link : http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fabric-Manufacturing-
Technology/459520217425605
3. Garments Manufacturing Technology
Link : http://www.facebook.com/pages/Garments-Manufacturing-
Technology/472364799463126
3. Wet processing Technology
Link : http://www.facebook.com/pages/Wet-Processing-Technology-Dyeing-
/468645219825404
4. Fashion-Design-and-Technology
Link : http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fashion-Design-and-
Technology/587655294583875?ref=ts&fref=ts
My Facebook Textile related Pages
http://www.textilelab.blogspot.com (Visit My Blog for more Info )