The rising global temperatures and ensuing climate change, coupled with the economic meltdown, is coming hard on the leather garment exporters of Kanpur. More than 50 leather exporters in the city are struggling hard to maintain the orders from their customers in Germany, the UK, the US and Australia.
The exporters recently visited the European countries to scout for orders but were unable to obtain desired results. The leather garment export from Kanpur so far has declined by about 50 per cent compared to the same period last year, acccording to Indra Mishra, regional director at the Council for Leather Exports (CLE) in Kanpur.
The volume of exports to the US has declined by around 17 per cent, while supply to Spain has witnessed a decline of 27 per cent.
Similarly, reduction in exports, ranging from 2 per cent (Germany) to 87 per cent (in case of Russia) has been registered in various cases, according to the statistics available at the CLE.
The fall in exports is partially due to the uncertain weather in the Western countries, which form the major market for domestic exporters.
“Every year we used to receive bulk orders for winterwear from September itself, but now the winters are getting delayed and climatic uncertainty is restraining the importers there,” said Taj Alam, a city-based exporter of leather products.
The manufacturers are trying to adapt their products to the rising temperatures by using textile in the leather apparels to reduce their warmth.
“The customers there are not being able to decide whether to buy products for summers or winters. Significant climate change has been seen in Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Italy, France in the past three years,” added Alam.
The abrupt changes in climate have become a routine occurrence in these nations. “The manufacturers are trying to design new kind of apparels which would serve the purpose in winters as well as in summers to upkeep the trade volume. We are also running various promotional campaigns there to create demand and awareness for our new range of products,” said Mohd Harun of Hindustan Exporters.
The fall in garment export is also ascribed to the ongoing global economic slowdown and in the India’s prime leather markets of the US and Europe.
The exporters have also begun to scout for new potential markets to offset the ill-effect of current decline.
“We are in talks with other importers in Latin America, Eastern Europe and also trying to sell our brand products there through road shows and other promotional offers,”
CLE Chairman, Mukhtar-ul-Amin told Business Standard Europe was the most important market for the leather products, but the financial crisis there meant that people would cut on spending in relatively luxurious items such as leather garments. He added that the consumption in relatively less luxurious items such as leather footwear had not slowed down.
Elaborating on the fallout of the drop in leather exports, Amin said, “The fall has put pressure on price. Additionally, importers are reducing the size of their inventory due to which the buyers want delivery in 40 days against the earlier duration of six months.
Consequently, a large number of exporters have been forced to fly their consignment against using the sea route, resulting in increased transportation costs. Therefore, the cost of exporting one jacket has increased from about sixty cents to $2.
