Country: Europe

The newly appointed President of Euratex, Klaus Huneke, believes that working in coherence and as a team with the entire membership along the strategic priorities, namely trade, innovation and sustainability, would bring better results for the textile and apparel industry.

Sharing his ambition, Huneke said, “The textile and apparel industry needs more and better Europe to maintain its competitiveness ahead of the world competitors. It will be our task to make clear to EU policymakers the value of maintaining strong, innovative and competitive textile and clothing value chains in Europe. I hope under my Presidency to convince to have greater coherence among policies and to favour targeted and efficient support more in line with textile and clothing companies’ needs and capabilities.”

The Euratex Chief is of the view that the EU textile and clothing companies should take advantage of the opportunities offered by the association, in terms of innovations and tools developed to help SMEs to improve their competitiveness.

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In addition to this, the association will keep supporting regional initiatives that it has taken lately, such as RegioTex to enhance the growth of the European textile and clothing industry.

EURATEX – the European Apparel and Textile Confederation – voice of the textile and clothing industry in Europe, has urged European Commission to “strongly act” and clarify its position on investigating anti-subsidy proceedings against China and on tackling barriers to trade in the country. The association reiterated that China does not meet the five criteria required to qualify as a market economy.

The association highlighted that the European Commission’s proposal to change the AD-AS legislation and introducing the concept of “significant distortion” may open a lot of uncertainty for the European companies. Some of the concerns that can arise are WTO compatibility, the drafting of the reports, the burden of proof, the management of the transition period, the timetable for adoption of this proposal and the subsequent reaction of China.

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Euartex also underlined the necessity to address sectoral problems through dedicated initiatives for issues like tackling barriers to trade in China, protecting IPR, ensuring stability of raw material prices and addressing over capacities remain. It also suggested DG Trade to set up a specific task force on over capacities in man-made fibres and yarns.

In the nine-month period ending September 30, 2016, total knitted apparels exports to the European Union (EU) has seen a positive trend with quantity increasing 6.28 per cent to 1.97 billion kg as against 1.86 billion kg in the year earlier period. Though values were marginally up by 0.08 per cent to Euro 30.23 billion versus Euro 30.20 billion in the first nine months of 2015.

The countries that majorly exported knitted garments to EU include Vietnam, Pakistan Bangladesh, India, among others. Among these countries, Vietnam’s export of knitted apparels were up 18.25 per cent to Euro 680.10 million as against Euro 575.16 million last year. It was followed by Pakistan which registered 13.34 per cent surge to Euro 803.33 million in its knitted garments exports to the EU.

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In bulk, however, Bangladesh saw an increase of 6.19 per cent to Euro 6.49 billion as compared to Euro 6.11 billion during the same period of 2015. Second to Bangladesh was India with knitted apparels exports rising by 1.19 per cent to Euro 2.04 billion in comparison to Euro 2.01 billion in the corresponding nine months of 2015.

Klaus Huneke, who holds an extensive international experience in the textile industry, has assumed charge as new President of Euratex (The European Apparel and Textile Organisation) for a two-year term. He succeeded Sege Piolat, who headed the organization during the last two years.

“Serge Piolat achieved impressive results in strengthening the voice of the European textile and clothing industry. To further enhance our industry, my intention is to focus on few strategic priorities such as better communication towards policymakers and stakeholders on the excellence of our innovation and sustainability, enhancing EU competitiveness and greater participation of companies in innovation,” Klaus Huneke was quoted as saying in a statement issued by the organization.

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Huneke previously served the role of CEO at Heimbach, a large technical textiles producer in Germany. He was also the Vice-president of the German textile employer’s association and has also been actively involved in representation of textile and clothing industry at the European level, acting as a Board Member and Vice-President Treasurer of Euratex.

Euratex is a non-profit organisation based in Brussels, Belgium engaged in promotion of the European textile and apparel industry.

TexClubTec, Italy-based association which aims for development and promotion of technical textiles and innovation, along with eight project partners, recently hosted the launch of the newly ERASMUS+ KA3 project TEXAPP at its premises in Milan, Italy.

The project titled ‘Integrated Strategy Initiative for Strengthening the supply of APPrenticeships in TEXtile sector’, coordinated by EURATEX, addresses the issue of apprenticeships delivery in the fashion sector dominated by SME’s and micro enterprises. The objective of TEXAPP is to foster and strengthen the supply of apprenticeships for SME’s and micro enterprises active in the sector through the close cooperation between Euratex and its partners – members and affiliates.

TEXAPP project partners will create and provide a structure and tools oriented towards the textiles and clothing sector considering the SME’s needs and obstacles they face in this regard through close cooperation. The sectoral tool package to be developed aims at assisting SME’s in setting up, planning, delivering and ensuring the quality of their apprenticeships, including apprentice assessment.

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Additionally, the project will act and produce targeted tools for pooling resources, sharing information, exchanging knowledge, developing ideas and learning from each other’ experiences.

The other project partners include The Huddersfield and District Textile Training Company, UK, Pirin-Tex EOOD, Bulgaria, Centro Tecnologico das Industrias Textil e do Vestuario de Portugal (CITEVE), Portugal, Textilipari Műszaki és Tudományos Egyesület (TMTE), Hungary, Bulgarian Association of Apparel and Textile Producers and Exporters (BAATPE), Bulgaria and Hellenic Clothing Industry Association (HCIA), Greece.