The Swedish Government has joined hands with Swiss-based International Trade Centre (ITC) to initiate a three-year programme that aims to enhance international competitiveness among apparel and textile producers in North Africa and Middle East.
The project is titled “Strengthening the International Competitiveness of the Textile and Clothing Sector in selected Middle East and North African Countries,” and aims at creating employment opportunities for people in countries like Jordan, Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia.
Besides, it intends to help the above-mentioned countries in building sustainable export-oriented sectors and focus on improving sales in conventional European markets.
The project will also focus on exploring new markets in sub-Saharan Africa.
Among some of its other goals are to provide better-salary jobs for women and youth as well as to improve the capacity of garment and textile associations so as to help the local industry grow.
The project also endeavours to help the garment and textile companies – through training – move up the supply chain from cutting and sewing to fabric sourcing and product development.
The Government of Sweden is funding the project with US $ 4.63 million, while the project will be implemented by ITC in collaboration with Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency.
