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Related Keywords: Africa, Asia, Asian textile industry, collapsing factories, Ethiopia, global textile, global textile brands, Inditex, Kenyan textile industry, production hub, soaring labour wages, Swedish chain H&M, US-based WalMart, value adding industry, violent workers protest

Global textile retailers have found alternatives to Asia as a production hub as they saw some bad event happening in Asia’s textile industry in the year 2014 like the soaring labour wages in China, violent workers’ protests in Cambodia and collapsing factories in Bangladesh. These events points at the fact that the entire Asia textile industry seems to be in transition and the transition lies in a shift to a more value-adding industry.

Related Keywords: AGOA, anti-dumping measures, cotton farming, cotton sector, EPZ textile companies, Kenyan textile industry, labour intensive value chain, liberalisation policies, mitumba, Rivatex, second hand clothes, WTO

Kenyan textile industry was flourishing in the 1980s before the influx of ‘mitumba’ into the country. Companies such as Rivatex offered jobs and clothed Kenyans in new clothes while Cotton farming in Nyanza and Western gave farmers a livelihood and provided cotton for the sector. This labour intensive value chain employed many Kenyans and significantly contributed to the fiscal revenue through taxes payable by the companies. Liberalisation policies followed a short while later and killed the sector.

Related Keywords: Cotton market, EPZ programme, fabric production, Kenyan textile industry, second hand garments, SEZ

The Kenyan textile industry has made a sizeable contribution to income generation in rural areas by providing a market for cotton. The major factor inhibiting the growth of a textile industry in Kenya is the high cost of electricity and it reliability which accounts for about 35 percent of the cost of fabric production in Kenya, compared to 16 per cent in India.

The Kenyan government has taken up the task to revive its textile and leather sectors, and to improve efficiency in manufacturing companies in order to boost trade in the country.