Team Apparel Resources, after a gap of around two years, was in Bangladesh recently to meet garment industry players and relevant stakeholders in the country. And, it was really heartening to see the overwhelming response we received from all 20 companies we touched base with as well as the BGMEA, who all are eagerly waiting for the second edition of the benchmark premium sourcing event – Apparel Sourcing Week.

The visit was focused on various issues of mutual interests that could be unlocked in the upcoming ASW 2022 and Apparel Resources, the organiser of the show and the publisher of the Apparel Online magazine, is only playing its part in bringing everyone together through its sourcing platform this July with renewed vigour, not to mention at a much bigger scale, with a promise of generating the right kind of value proposition, to help create a win-win situation for all.

“It’s important to provide more avenues and platforms to bring manufacturers and exporters of both countries closer so that they can reap mutual trade benefits,” were the words of BGMEA Chief Faruque Hassan, who strongly endorsed the idea of Collaborate, not Compete to increase presence of both India and Bangladesh in global perspective through strategic collaborations.

BGMEA’s views were also echoed by the rest of the players including the bigwigs such as Sparrow Apparels; Mahmud Group; Fashion Flash Ltd.; Khantex Fashion Limited (KFL) Group; Green Smart Shirts Ltd.; Anzir Apparels; Bengal Hurricane Group; SQ Group; Energypac Fashion; Sonia & Sweaters; and Anowara Group among many others.

In fact, Shawn Islam, Managing Director of Sparrow Apparels went on to say that India is a market that can’t be overlooked by the Bangladeshi RMG manufacturers since it has a huge fashion retail sector and an equally enriched heritage in raw materials and design & development that Bangladesh should capitalise on to gain expertise and move up the value chain.

Propagating the same, Humayun Salim, MD of KFL Group, averred that Bangladesh is already importing raw material from India worth billions of dollars and now is the time to tap the ever-evolving fashion retail market of the country as well – at much faster rate than ever before, therefore, ASW 2022 is expected to be a key sourcing platform for all participants.

KFL Group, which is a relatively new but very promising entity, is joining ASW 2022 as an exhibitor to explore what Indian market holds for it.

Helal Uddin Ahmed, Chairman of Fashion Flash Limited (FFL) – a leading highfashion denim product manufacturer – was ecstatic when he met our team and sounded he was already aware of the event – all thanks to the rapidly increasing word of mouth among Bangladesh’s RMG players, and thanked our team for the irresistible offerings for exhibitors at the much-awaited second edition of ASW.

Named one of the fastest growing shirt manufacturers in Bangladesh that has recently forayed into high-fashion womenswear segment too, Green Smart Shirt Ltd. (GSSL) – led by Fateh UlIslam– sees India as one of its top priority markets for both menswear and womenswear as it aims at clocking US $ 50 million turnover by 2023 end.

“And for that, India will be a key growth driver for us,” maintained Fateh.

Being a participant in the very first edition of ASW in 2019 , Ashish Sharma, MD, Anzir Apparels knows what US $ 88 billion worth of apparel retail industry of India has on offer for Bangladesh’s apparel manufacturers and who’s who of the Indian fashion retail sector.

Expectedly, Ashish, was more than elated to mark his company’s presence in the second edition of ASW as well.

Another giant in Bangladesh’s garment manufacturing industry – Bengal Hurricane Group – was also in favour of developing regional value chain with India to grab untapped opportunities in the Indian apparel retail industry.

“I see a lot of Bangladeshi companies working with Indian retailers and this is only going to gain pace. We are already working with a few retailers there. However as a group, we would like to see what more India has on offers for us,” said Bozlur Rahman Bhuiya (Tony), Director of the company.

ASW ’22 gives you the opportunity that you have been looking for towards forging the right kind of mutual relationship through collaboration with Indian apparel and textile industry stakeholders for a meaningful business relationship and enriching experience.

Hope you have marked the dates of Asia’s most sought-after sourcing event that is scheduled to be held at Sheraton Hotel in Bengaluru, India on 1-2 July 2022.