The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Export earning in the country's knitwear sector, which has seen a phenomenal growth over the last few years, has increased by US 115 million dollars in the first five months of the current fiscal, industry sources said.

The exports of knitwear, in the first five months of present financial year, which runs through July to June (2007-08), saw a boost of 2.4 per cent reaching US 5.166 billion dollars compared to US 5.045 billion dollar during the corresponding period of last year.

In this period, from July to November (2007-08), knitwear exports rose by 6.19 per cent, earning US 2.03 billion dollars compared to US 1.915 billion dollars during the same period of the previous year.

"The knitwear is one of the fast growing industries of Bangladesh, as fabric for knitwear spinning is easily available in the market and investment required to produce this particular material is quite small compared to other sectors," Mr Farhad Hussain, Senior Executive, BGMEA told journalists, while painting a rosy picture of the knitwear sector.

The BGMEA executive also said that although, the country mainly targets to meet the US demands, however, has explored newer markets like that of Russia, Korea and other North American countries for exports during this period.

Shedding light on the workers front, Mr Hussain said, "Labour, in the country used to be underpaid. The garment sector engages the highest number of women labourers and most of them were unskilled."

"However, in order to diminish the woes of this working class, the Government has increased their wages. This, in turn, proved fruitful for the industry."