By Du Xiaoli (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2007-08-11 15:28

China's textile and garment exports reached US$144 billion in 2006, with a surplus of US$125.9 billion, accounting for 70.9 percent of the country’s total surplus of goods trade. China's textile industry maintained a growth of 14.9 percent in the first quarter of this year, with a surplus of US$27.36 billion.

Changes in the international industrial structure are the main reason for China's durative big surplus in recent years, said Gao Hucheng, vice-minister of the Ministry of Commerce. However, high surplus does not equal high profit.

In fact, the exporters only gain a small part of profit when Chinese products are exported to the European and US markets, as importers and retailers are the biggest beneficiaries. China's textile products manufacturers only take 10 percent of profits in the whole benefit chains, while 90 percent of profits belong to the brand owners, wholesalers, distributors and retailers, said experts.

Chinese textile enterprises also import a great deal of cotton, cloth and advanced textile equipment from the United States every year in order to meet the export demand.

Lack of brands resulted in gaining the minimum profit in the whole value chain. The urgent tasks for China’s textile industry are to build brands, adjust industrial structure and change the mode of growth.

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