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In the first 10 months of 2023, China’s home textile foreign trade exports declined slightly, and exports fluctuated greatly, but the overall export situation of textile and apparel was still relatively stable. At present, after the growth of home textile exports in August and September, exports returned to the decline channel in October, and the cumulative negative growth was still maintained. China’s exports to traditional markets such as the United States and Europe have gradually recovered, and after the completion of overseas inventory digestion, it is expected that exports will gradually stabilize in the later stage.

The cumulative decline in exports in October widened

After a small increase in August and September, my home textile exports fell again in October, down by 3%, and the export amount fell from 3.13 billion US dollars in September to 2.81 billion US dollars. From January to October, China’s cumulative exports of home textiles were 27.33 billion US dollars, down slightly by 0.5%, and the cumulative decline increased by 0.3 percentage points from the previous month.

In the product category, cumulative exports of carpets, kitchen supplies and tablecloths maintained positive growth. Specifically, carpet exports of 3.32 billion US dollars, an increase of 4.4%; Exports of kitchen goods were 2.43 billion US dollars, up 9% year on year; The export of tablecloth was 670 million US dollars, up 4.3% year-on-year. In addition, the export value of bed products was 11.57 billion US dollars, down 1.8% year-on-year; Towel exports amounted to 1.84 billion US dollars, down 7.9% year on year; Exports of blankets, curtains and other decorative goods continued to decline by 0.9 per cent, 2.1 per cent and 3.2 per cent, respectively, all at a reduced rate from the previous month.

Exports to the United States and Europe accelerated recovery, while exports to emerging countries slowed down

The top four markets for China’s home textile exports are the United States, ASEAN, the European Union and Japan. From January to October, exports to the United States were 8.65 billion US dollars, down 1.5% year-on-year, and the cumulative decline continued to narrow by 2.7 percentage points compared with the previous month; Exports to ASEAN reached US $3.2 billion, up 1.5% year-on-year, and the cumulative growth rate continued to slow down by 5 percentage points compared with the previous month; Exports to the EU were US $3.35 billion, down 5% year-on-year and 1.6 percentage points lower than last month; Exports to Japan were US $2.17 billion, down 12.8% year on year, up 1.6 percentage points from the previous month; Exports to Australia amounted to US $980 million, down 6.9%, or 1.4 percentage points.

From January to October, exports to countries along the Belt and Road reached 7.43 billion U.S. dollars, up 6.9 percent year on year. Its exports to the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries in the Middle East were US $1.21 billion, down 3.3% year-on-year. Exports to the five Central Asian countries reached 680 million US dollars, maintaining a rapid growth of 46.1%; Its export to Africa was US $1.17 billion, up 10.1% year-on-year; Exports to Latin America were $1.39 billion, up 6.3%.

The export performance of major provinces and cities is uneven. Zhejiang and Guangdong maintain positive growth

Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Shandong, Guangdong and Shanghai ranked among the top five home textile export provinces and cities. Among the top several provinces and cities, except for Shandong, the decline has expanded, and other provinces and cities have maintained positive growth or narrowed the decline. From January to October, Zhejiang’s exports reached 8.43 billion US dollars, up 2.8% year-on-year; Jiangsu’s exports were $5.94 billion, down 4.7%; Shandong’s exports were $3.63 billion, down 8.9%; Guangdong’s export was US $2.36 billion, up 19.7%; Shanghai’s exports were $1.66 billion, down 13%. Among other regions, Xinjiang and Heilongjiang maintained high export growth by relying on border trade, increasing by 84.2% and 95.6% respectively.

The United States, Europe and Japan home textile imports showed a downward trend

From January to September 2023, the United States imported 12.32 billion US dollars of home textile products, down 21.4%, of which imports from China fell 26.3%, accounting for 42.4%, down 2.8 percentage points from the same period last year. Over the same period, US imports from India, Pakistan, Turkey and Vietnam fell 17.7 per cent, 20.7 per cent, 21.8 per cent and 27 per cent, respectively. Among the major sources of imports, only imports from Mexico increased by 14.4 percent.

From January to September, EU imports of home textile products were 7.34 billion US dollars, down 17.7%, of which imports from China fell 22.7%, accounting for 35%, down 2.3 percentage points from the same period last year. Over the same period, EU imports from Pakistan, Turkey and India fell by 13.8 per cent, 12.2 per cent and 24.8 per cent respectively, while imports from the UK increased by 7.3 per cent.

From January to September, Japan imported 2.7 billion US dollars of home textile products, down 11.2%, of which imports from China fell 12.2%, accounting for 74%, down 0.8 percentage points from the same period last year. Imports from Vietnam, India, Thailand and Indonesia fell 7.1 per cent, 24.3 per cent, 3.4 per cent and 5.2 per cent, respectively, over the same period.

Overall, the international home textile market is gradually returning to normalization after experiencing fluctuations. The demand of traditional international markets such as the United States and Europe is rapidly recovering, and the basic digestion of inventory has ended and the shopping season such as “Black Friday” has promoted the rapid recovery of my home textile exports to the United States and Europe since August. However, the demand of emerging markets has relatively slowed down, and exports to them have gradually recovered from high-speed growth to normal growth levels. In the future, our textile export enterprises should strive to walk on two legs, while actively exploring new markets, stabilize the growth share of traditional markets, avoid over-reliance on the risk of a single market, and achieve a diversified layout of the international market.