Sri Lanka’s apparel industry has welcomed the decision to renegotiate the FTA with India as it will open up more access to export apparels to the lucrative Indian market.
Addressing a program, Hasitha Premaratne, MD, Brandix Group said, “Currently we can only export 8 million pieces per year and with the Indian middle class growing we can market more quality apparels to India and increase our revenue to around US $ 1 billion in the future.”
Brandix Group is Sri Lanka’s top apparel exporter and does have operations in India.
He further added that with India – China political tensions, Chinese exports are low to India and Sri Lanka sportswear exports can reap huge economic benefits by exporting to India.
Exporters in Sri Lanka believe that the 2024 Budget proposed new FTA with India will pave the way for this.
It can be mentioned here that Sri Lanka’s total apparel export revenue touched the US $ 6 billion mark before the pandemic and this year end it may be around US $ 5 billion.