His assessment is based on various factors. One is Bangladesh knitting market’s exports of piece goods, or ready-made clothing, which have been on the increase for years. According to the Pakistani newspaper The Dawn, Bangladeshi companies exported clothing worth US$ 30 billion in 2018. Bangladesh, the newspaper claimed, came second only to China, the world’s largest exporter, and by 2023 this figure is set to nearly double to US$ 50 billion.
The demand for circular knitting machines is correspondingly strong and constant. For years Bangladesh has been one of Mayer & Cie.’s foremost markets. Two thirds of this demand is for single jersey, one third for double jersey machines. There are many indications that this demand structure is unlikely to change much in the near future. “Due to lower wage costs many ‘standard orders’ are passed on from China to Bangladesh,” Bühler explains. “They include, for example, casual outer- and leisurewear consisting mainly of single jersey fabrics and double jersey with micro-structure effects.”
Bangladesh Knitting Market
The DTG Textile and Garment Machinery Exhibition, held from 9 to 12 January 2019 in Dhaka, reaffirmed this trend. “The fair was once more very well attended,” sales specialist Bühler says. The organisers said 38,000 visitors came in 2018; figures for this year are not yet available. The range of visitors also merited a mention, he said. “We would otherwise never be able in such a short time to see and talk with so many customers, existing and potential. For our ‘ear on the market’ the DTG is very exciting year after year.”
A special attraction this year was the Mayer & Cie. exhibit: an E 28 gauge 34-inch diameter Relanit 3.2 HS. This model is one of the manufacturer’s bestsellers due to its productivity, its gentle yarn processing, and its high degree of reliability, especially in handling elastomer yarns.
“All of the visitors were impressed when our high-performance machine was working at full speed,” Bühler says. And not only that: in connection with the trade fair a new customer was convinced of the Relanit 3.2 HS’s benefits and ordered a significant number of machines – “for test purposes. We are naturally very keen to see how this project develops,” says area sales manager Bühler.