Bangladesh is losing ground in the US with apparel export falling behind Vietnam, and India due to lack of product diversification and rising production cost of local apparel products. The country's exported apparels worth $4.35 billion to the US in the first 10 months (January-October) of the current calendar year, which is 4.93 per cent lower than the value of exports during the corresponding period of the previous year.

As per the US Department of Commerce’s Office of Textiles and Apparel (Otexa), Bangladesh’s export earnings from US saw a 4.46 per cent fall to $5.07 billion in 2017, which was $5.30 billion a year ago. Bangladesh’s market share in US apparel market came down to 6.31 per cent. Apparel import by the US saw a 1.04 per cent rise in volume terms during the January to October 2017 period. US, the largest apparel importer in the world imported 23,109.54 million SME of apparels during the review period as against 22872.37 million SME in the prior-year period.

China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Indonesia and India were the top five apparel exporters to the US during the first 10 months of 2017. The countries exported apparels worth $ 23.16 billion (down 3.64 per cent), $9.84 billion (up 6.79 per cent), $ 4.35 billion (down 4.93 per cent), $ 3.93 billion (down 2.81 per cent) and $3.22 billion (up 2.06 per cent), respectively.

The cumulative apparel import data of the US will further rise till the end of 2017 as per the projection. Holiday season sales are also expected to surge by 4 per cent this year in the country.