“A record number of US fashion companies no longer list China as their top supplier, the result of growing diplomatic uncertainty and concerns about forced labor.
About 61% of apparel retail CEOs haves stopped using China as their primary supplier, up from 30% before the pandemic, according to a new survey by the US Fashion Industry Association and Sheng Lu, an associate professor of fashion and apparel studies at the University of Delaware.
Almost 80% plan to reduce their sourcing from China over the next two years. Those companies are primarily leaving China for Vietnam, Bangladesh and India, which have relatively large-scale production capacity and stable economic and political situations, according to the report…
Measured in value, US apparel imports from China fell to 18.3% in the first five months of this year, compared with 30% in 2019, the USFIA report found. China accounted for just 10% of cotton imports to the US, the lowest level since 2017.
Meanwhile, US apparel imports from the five largest Asian suppliers other than China — Vietnam, Bangladesh, Indonesia, India and Cambodia — reached a new high of 44.3% over that same period.”