Chennai: Apparel exports continued to decline in FY19, as the total textile products exports remained flat. Apparel shipments were down 3.42 per cent, while total textile products grew 1.66 per cent.

In FY19, the country exported apparels valued $16.138 billion against $16.706 billion in FY18, as per the data from Confederation of Indian Textile Industry. In FY18 apparel exports had de-grown by 4 per cent.

The decline in India’s apparel exports in FY19 was primarily driven by a sharp decline witnessed in shipments to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) from July 2017 onwards. Apparel exports to UAE, which was growing fast in past few years, started declining sharply after the introduction of GST in July 2017 and reduction of duty drawback rates in October that year.

Exports have been de-growing till September this year. But October onwards, exports showed a recovery against the low base of the same months in the previous fiscal. This low base helped exports grow in the month of March by 15.13 per cent. However, compared to FY17’s exports of $17.4 billion, FY19’s export of $16.1 billion is still 7.47 per cent lower.

The apparel exports held back the growth in total exports in FY19 at $35 billion. There was just a marginal growth of 1.66 per cent.