Since the beginning of this year, in the face of a more complex and severe international environment and more urgent high-quality development tasks under the new situation, China's textile industry has fully implemented the decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee and the State Council, closely focused on the strategic goals of high-quality development and the construction of a modern industrial system, upheld the overall tone of steady progress work, and continued to deepen the transformation of the industry into high-end, intelligent, and green. With the comprehensive restoration of normalized operation of China's economy and society, domestic sales in the textile industry have shown a rebound trend, and the industrial cycle is becoming smoother. However, due to factors such as weak external demand, complex trade environment, and high production costs, the main operational indicators of the textile industry, such as production, efficiency, and investment, have all grown under pressure in the first half of the year, while export pressure has significantly increased. Looking ahead to the whole year, the development situation of the textile industry remains complex and severe. There are still many risk factors such as insufficient momentum for global economic recovery, contraction of external demand, intensified international market competition, and high pressure on enterprise production and operation. The foundation for stabilizing and improving the textile industry still needs to be consolidated.
The overall prosperity of the industry continues to rebound, and the production situation continues to recover
In the first half of this year, with the continuous improvement of the domestic market situation and the coordinated support of national macroeconomic policies, the overall prosperity of China's textile industry has maintained a rebound, and the development expectations of enterprises have improved. According to a survey conducted by the China Textile Industry Federation, the comprehensive prosperity index of China's textile industry in the second quarter was 57%, with an increase of 10.7 and 1.4 percentage points compared to the same period last year and the first quarter of this year, respectively, which is the highest level since 2022.
Due to the sluggish external demand, the production situation in the textile industry has fluctuated slightly this year, but the decline has gradually narrowed. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, the production capacity utilization rates of the textile and chemical fiber industries in the first half of the year were 76.2% and 83.2%, respectively, slowing by 1.8 and 0.8 percentage points compared to the same period last year. However, they have rebounded by 0.7 and 1.1 percentage points compared to the first quarter of this year, higher than the production capacity utilization level of 74.7% in the manufacturing industry during the same period. In the first half of the year, the industrial added value of enterprises above designated size in the textile industry decreased by 3% year-on-year, with a growth rate dropping by 3.9 percentage points compared to the same period last year, but rebounding by 0.7 percentage points compared to the first quarter of this year. The industrial added value of sub industries such as chemical fiber, cotton textile, and filament weaving achieved positive growth.
Domestic sales are steadily recovering and improving, while export pressure and resilience coexist
Since the beginning of this year, the production and living order in China has been orderly restored, and the expansion of consumption scenarios and the implementation of consumption promotion policies have significantly driven the domestic demand for textiles and clothing to achieve good growth. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, in the first half of the year, the retail sales of clothing, shoes, hats, and textiles above designated size in China increased by 12.8% year-on-year, and the cumulative growth rate has maintained a double-digit fast growth level since April this year. New models such as live streaming and short videos have driven a good growth in online retail channels. In the first half of the year, the online retail sales of clothing products in China increased by 13.3% year-on-year, with a growth rate of 10.9 and 4.7 percentage points respectively compared to the same period last year and the first quarter of this year, higher than the retail growth rate of food and consumer goods in the same period.
Due to factors such as shrinking overseas demand and a more complex international trade environment, the export pressure of China's textile industry has significantly increased since the beginning of this year, but it still shows good resilience in exports to some markets. According to Chinese customs data, China's total textile and clothing exports in the first half of the year were 142.68 billion US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 8.8%. The growth rate slowed down by 20.5 and 1.9 percentage points compared to the same period last year and the first quarter of this year, respectively. Among the main export products, the export value of textiles was 67.7 billion US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 10.9%, a decrease of 1.2 percentage points compared to the first quarter; The export value of clothing was 74.98 billion US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 5.9%, which is 4.6 percentage points deeper than the first quarter. Among the main export markets, China's textile and clothing exports to the United States, the European Union and Japan declined respectively year on year, and the textile and clothing exports to South Korea, Australia, Russia, five Central Asian countries and other countries along the "the Belt and Road" achieved good growth over the same period.
The decrease in efficiency narrows month by month, and the investment scale decreases slightly
Since the beginning of this year, against the backdrop of sluggish external demand and high costs, the efficiency of the textile industry has declined. However, with the recovery of domestic sales and the effective implementation of various national regulatory measures, the decline in industry efficiency has narrowed month by month, and the pressure on production and operation has eased compared to the first quarter. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, in the first half of the year, the operating income and total profit of 37000 textile enterprises above designated size in China decreased by 5.1% and 21.3% year-on-year, respectively, a decrease of 10.8 and 4.3 percentage points compared to the same period last year, but an increase of 2.2 and 11.1 percentage points compared to the first quarter of this year. The profitability of most links in the industrial chain has improved compared to the first quarter, with the total profit of the wool textile, silk, home textile, and textile machinery industries achieving positive growth.
Under the situation of increasing pressure on production and operation, textile enterprises have a slight lack of confidence in investment, and the scale of industry investment has shrunk. In the first half of the year, the completed amount of fixed assets investment in the textile industry, clothing industry and chemical fiber industry decreased by 2%, 5.3% and 7% respectively year on year, of which the decrease in the amount of investment in the textile industry narrowed by 2.3 percentage points compared with the first quarter.
The development situation remains severe, and joint efforts are being made to stabilize under pressure
In the first half of the year, the textile industry actively seized the favorable opportunity for China's comprehensive restoration of normal economic and social operations, worked hard to overcome risks and challenges such as insufficient demand and high business pressure, and continuously improved its risk resistance and development resilience. Although the main economic indicators were in a low operating trend, they showed signs of stabilization, playing a due role in promoting the recovery of the national economy and assisting in improving people's livelihoods.
Looking ahead to the whole year, there are still many unstable and uncertain factors in the development of the textile industry, and there are still many difficulties and challenges in achieving a stable recovery and improvement. The international situation is complex and complex. The negative effects of sustained interest rate hikes in developed economies are evident, inflation pressure remains high, and uncertain factors such as the decline in international supply chain cooperation efficiency increase the risk of global economic recession, constraining the improvement of international market demand. The overall domestic macroeconomic situation will maintain a recovery trend, and the foundation remains unstable. The super large scale and constantly upgrading domestic demand market will still be the primary driving force for the high-quality development of the textile industry; The series of policies and measures introduced by the country in areas such as safeguarding people's livelihoods, promoting consumption, and supporting the development and growth of the private economy provide important guarantees for the improvement and optimization of market demand and business environment in the textile industry. The textile industry still needs to seize the favorable opportunity for a smoother domestic production demand cycle, based on the domestic demand market from multiple perspectives, levels, and fields, focus on promoting technological innovation, business format innovation, and supply chain updates, continuously tap market potential, stimulate operational vitality, better coordinate rational growth in quantity and effective improvement in quality, and form a joint force to promote high-quality development.
The textile industry will fully implement the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and the relevant decisions and deployments of the Central Economic Work Conference, adhere to the overall tone of seeking progress while maintaining stability, continuously consolidate the foundation of stability and recovery, actively integrate and serve to build a new development pattern, accelerate the accumulation and enhancement of high-quality development resilience, strive to ensure the stability and safe operation of the industrial chain supply chain, and continue to play a good role in ensuring supply and activating domestic demand in the textile industry The positive role of improving employment and income is to make due contributions to promoting the continuous improvement of industry economic operation, completing the main goals and tasks of economic and social development throughout the year, and laying a solid foundation for development in building a modern industrial system.
(Source: China Textile Federation Industrial Economics Research Institute)