International Textile Manufacturers Federation (ITMF) conducted the 12th ITMF Corona Survey among more than 270 companies around the world in all segments along the textile value chain in January 2022. Companies were asked the same set of questions about their business situation, business expectation, order intake, order backlog, and capacity utilization rate for the fifth time since May 2021.
12th ITMF Corona Survey shows a positive outlook despite Omicron
The business situation is still very favourable with 23 percentage points (pp), albeit lower than compared to November 2021 (+28pp) on average across all regions and all segments, according to the survey. This high level is remarkable given the fast-rising infection number of the Corona-variant “Omicron” since the 11th ITMF Corona-Survey. The fact that a rising number of companies find themselves in a satisfactory business situation (48%) is an indication of a strong and broad recovery.
The global textile value chain remains very optimistic when it comes to business expectations in six months. While the balance between more favourable and less favourable has fallen from 33pp to 25pp, it needs to be considered that these expectations are built on a very favourable business situation. According to this, only 14% of companies are anticipating a less favourable business by July 2022.
A look at the different regions reveals that the business situation is in positive territory in all regions except for East Asia and Africa where the balance between good and bad business situations is negative, and the expectations are very positive except for East Asia. As for the different segments, the downstream segments (weavers/knitters, finishers/printers, and garment producers) are catching up with the upstream segments (fibre producers, spinners, and textile machinery producers).
Order intake down 10 points compared to November 2021
The order intake has fallen from a high level of 40pp in November 2021 to 30pp in January 2022 which is in line with the slightly weaker business situation. Order intake expectations achieved the level of 40 points in January, they remained at the same level as November with a decrease of 1 point.
Since May 2021 order backlog is hovering between 2.4 and 2.9 months. The survey reveals that expectations remain unchanged in the next six months. The capacity utilization rate continues to increase slowly but continuously since May 2021, indicating that supply chain disruption is still a big concern.