Historical background of the Garments and Garments Industry in Bangladesh

Bangladeshi Muslin and jamdani cloth achieved worldwide fame. During the British rule, they didn’t develop our cloth industries at all. Rather they destroyed it and start importing clothes from England. Till 1960 individual tailors made garments as per specifications provided by individual customers who supplied the fabrics. 

The A hundred percent export-oriented RMG industry experienced phenomenal growth during the last 15 or so years.  there were few export garment manufacturing units, which generated export earnings of hardly one million dollars. 

Reaz garment was the first garment that was started as a tailoring shop, then it changed its name and become Reaz garments limited In 1980. Bangladeshi partners contributed 51% of the equity of the new firm, named Young ones Bangladesh, and exported its first consignment of padded and non-padded jackets to Sweden.

Growth of Industry Equipment:

Year	Number of Garment Industries	Employment in Million Workers
1983-84	134	0.040
1988-89	759	0.317
1993-94	1839	0.827
1998-99	2963	1.500
2003-04	3957	2.000
2008-09	4825	3.100

[Source: BGMEA]

Reasons for the development of the Apparel Industry:

Due to the cheap labor, the garment industries have come out to be the champion in the field of export Bangladesh has a cheap rate of labor which is not anywhere in the world  Both external and internal factors contributed to the phenomenal growth of the RMG sector. 

On the other side, the application of MFA worked as a blessing for Bangladesh. As a least developed country, Bangladesh received preferential treatment from The USA and the European Union (EU). Initially, Bangladesh was granted quota-free status.

RMG the industry suffered a setback in a number of countries in the 1980s. Some countries had internal problems, for example, Sri Lanka; and some other countries of Southeast Asia experienced a rapid increase in labor costs. Buyers looked for alternative sources. In addition, the USA and Canada allocated substantially large quotas to Bangladesh. These privileges guaranteed Bangladesh assured markets for its garments in the USA, Canada, and the EU. Moreover, the domestic policies of the government contributed to the rapid growth of this sector. 

Garments of Bangladesh in the world market:

 the largest source of earning foreign currency. Almost half of the foreign currency from the ready-made garments is earned from the European Union and the U.S.A. along with these two counties foreign currency also comes from Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand; Russia, etc. also are other garments importing countries. At present, about 20 countries in the world are importers of our garments.