News Center

This year marks 70 years since the founding of New China, and the Chinese nation has made a historic leap from standing up, getting rich to becoming strong. In this great change, the textile industry has achieved all-round and deep-seated development and is playing an increasingly important role in serving the overall situation of the national strategy.

The textile industry is one of the industrial sectors that China has the most potential to take the lead in entering the ranks of the world's manufacturing powers. In 2018, China's total fiber processing volume was about 54.6 million tons, accounting for more than half of the world; China's textile and clothing exports totaled 276.73 billion billion US dollars, accounting for more than 36% of the world. From raw material supply, design and research, to textile dyeing and processing, clothing manufacturing, operation and retail, China's textile industry has formed the largest and most complete industrial system in the world. It is an industrial sector with independent innovation ability of the whole industry chain. It has continuously caught up with and surpassed the advanced in the fields of high-performance and high-functional fiber and equipment manufacturing. Since 2011, a total of 23 achievements in the industry have won national science and technology awards, including two first prizes for national science and technology progress.

The textile industry is an important industrial force in stabilizing growth, promoting employment, benefiting people's livelihood and preventing risks in the national economy. The status of China's textile industry as a pillar industry has never been shaken. In 2018, the main business income of textile enterprises above designated size reached 5370.35 billion billion yuan, accounting for 5.3 percent of the country's industries above designated size; net foreign exchange earnings were US $250.19 billion billion, accounting for 71.1 percent of the country. The industry plays a constructive role in maintaining currency stability, balancing the balance of payments, ensuring economic and financial security, and serving the national development strategy. In the field of people's livelihood, such as clothing, food, housing and transportation, the problem of clothing has been solved most thoroughly. More than 20 million people are employed in the industry, providing more than 1000 million jobs for rural migrant workers every year. The status of the livelihood industry has become increasingly prominent.

The textile industry is an important industrial platform to establish cultural self-confidence and promote the construction of a community of human destiny. As a cultural carrier, textiles and clothing contain a country's cultural traditions and values. Promoting fashion discourse power is an important way to establish cultural confidence. In recent years, the international influence of Chinese clothing brands such as Li Ning, Bosideng and Anta has increased significantly; Chinese designers have begun to move towards the center of the world stage, and Chinese elements and designs are gaining more and more recognition. The textile industry is a key area of international high-quality production capacity cooperation on the "Belt and Road", which has strongly promoted the industrialization process of the host country and the development of related industries. As the first industry in China to promote the institutionalization of social responsibility work, textiles play an important role in promoting multi-dimensional responsibility and co-governance in the global industrial chain.

Facing the future, the industry should maintain strategic determination and implement the industrial positioning of "science and technology, fashion and green. "Innovation-driven technology industry, culture-led fashion industry, and responsibility-oriented green industry" should become the strategic focus of the textile industry to promote high-quality development. To correct the social cognitive bias towards the industry, there are traditional economic contents in the new economy and emerging productive forces in mature industries. It is necessary to accelerate the improvement of the industry's independent innovation capability and innovation quality, and tackle key technologies in the fields of materials, equipment, and technology. With "masters, big names, and big events" as the starting point, we will build a fashion ecology, strengthen trend research, fashion design and brand building, establish cultural self-confidence, and cultivate the consumer market. With human responsibility, environmental responsibility and market responsibility as the content, deepen the construction of industry social responsibility and create a green supply chain.

Facing the future, the industry should accumulate development momentum and do a good job in the team building of "educating, employing and cultivating people. The essence of innovation-driven is talent-driven, and the key to innovation and development is talent development. It is necessary to take people as the center, gather and train all kinds of talents needed for the development of the industry, including industrial workers, entrepreneurs, scientists and designers.

Facing the future, the industry should stimulate the vitality of resources and improve the layout of "cluster, intensive and cross-border" productivity. On the one hand, we should enhance the industrial concentration, cultivate a number of world-class textile and garment enterprises with international competitiveness, and cultivate individual champions in the industry segmentation field; on the other hand, we should cultivate a platform economy and promote the integration and development of large and medium-sized enterprises. Cross-border development should focus on promoting the integrated development of advanced manufacturing and modern service industries, deepen the integration of industrialization and industrialization, industry-finance cooperation and military-civilian integration, be inclusive, and integrate resources to promote technology, product, application and model innovation. (The author is President of China Textile Industry Federation)