Close on heels of Bangladesh increasing the apparel wastage ratio — wastage ratio is the permissible amount of wastage in case of goods made from yarn and fabrics — the apex garment makers’ body of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) has requested the country’s Commerce Ministry to raise further the wastage ratio.
Media reports maintained this adding the garment makers’ body proposed wastage ratio for sweaters and socks up to 16 per cent from existing 4 per cent, while underlining if the ratio was not fixed “logically,” annual sweater export, which is said to be around worth US $ 4 – US $ 5 billion, will be in trouble, resulting in many factories facing crisis and workers unemployed even as according to reports, the ratio remained the same at 16 per cent since 1998 until the Commerce Ministry recently readjusted the same in December this year.
It may be mentioned here that soon after the Commerce Ministry issued notification on readjusted rates, BKMEA, the knitwear manufacturers’ body, requested the concerned ministry to reconsider the same and proposed wastage ratios be set at 30 per cent, 35 per cent and 12 per cent, respectively, for knitwear, special items and sweaters and socks while underlining sweater wastage ratio rearranged at 12 per cent, which the BGMEA has, reportedly, now proposed to be set at 16 per cent even as it underlined the 4 per cent wastage rate for sweaters and socks is “completely unacceptable.”
