From the Sector

On the occasion of releasing its 2021 Spring Report, EURATEX calls the European Institutions to implement a new Industrial Strategy which will effectively support the European textiles industry. EURATEX welcomes the fact that Textile and Clothing industry is recognised as one of the 14 essential ecosystems of the European economy, but we need to take effective measures to support these sectors, and take into consideration the global dimension.

Economic data for 2020 in EURATEX Spring Report show preoccupying trends. Figures reflect a dramatic contraction in demand and production: EU turnover contracted by -9.3% in textiles (which is in line with the general manufacturing average) and by -17.7% in clothing, compared with 2019. Furthermore, supply chain disruptions and substantial price increases of some raw materials are putting significant pressure on the T&C industries across Europe. The trade deficit for European textiles and clothing jumped from € -47 bln in 2019 to € -62 bln in 2020, an increase of more than 30%, which is almost entirely due to the import of Chinese face masks and related products. Fortunately, more recent figures from the 1st quarter of 2021 indicate some signs of recovery.

That figure illustrates very well today’s political discussions on the future of the European industry. Many European companies have made considerable efforts to adapt their production to the pandemic, but clearly this was not enough. Whether the production cost in Europe is too high or the EU should adapt its procurement rules, the industry needs have a coherent long-term plan to become more competitive and conquer new markets.

EURATEX General Assembly highlighted the critical role of the new EU Industrial Strategy. The inclusion of textiles and clothing in the fourteen ecosystems is a step in the right direction to consolidate the industrial base but we should look also at the global challenges. European companies should continue investing in innovation, design and quality, in combination with a structural move towards more sustainable textiles. At the same time, the EU should create an environment - both inside the Single Market and globally - where everybody plays by the same rules.

• European Apparel and Textile Confederation EURATEX welcomes revamped EU Industry Strategy, but calls for consistency across EU policies

Europe’s industry is going through turbulent times as a result of the corona-pandemic; turnover in textiles and clothing sector dropped between 10 and 20%. However, even bigger challenges lie ahead: serious disruptions in supply chains, soaring energy prices and protective tendencies are threatening the competitiveness of our industry.

Against that background, the revised EU Industry Strategy – launched on May, 5 - is addressing very relevant issues, and underlines the need to think carefully about Europe’s industrial base. EURATEX welcomes the initiative, including the focus on 14 “eco-systems” and the proposal to develop privileged partnerships with trusted partners.

At the same time, EURATEX calls for more consistency by the EU across its different policy areas. Director General Dirk Vantyghem commented: “We welcome the recognition that we need a strong industrial base in Europe, but at the same time are struggling to maintain that base, as our companies face significant challenges related to over-regulation and raising energy and supply costs. It feels like one hand offering you help, while the other hand squeezes you tight”.

Looking at the global perspective, EURATEX is not calling to close the European borders; our industrial model relies on accessing global markets. But clearly, there is a need to establish global rules to ensure fair competition, and make sure these rules are properly implemented and controlled. Also today’s proposal to address distortions caused by foreign subsidies in the Single Market, should be welcomed in this context.

Dirk Vantyghem concluded: “European textiles and clothing industry went through turbulent times. Today, as part of this new EU Industry Strategy, we have an opportunity to build a new business model, based on innovation, quality, sustainability and fairness. We look forward to develop that new EU Textile strategy with all stakeholders involved.”

National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) President and CEO Kim Glas issued a statement today on the White House announcement that President Biden will sign an executive order today, “ensuring the future of America is Made in America by all of America’s workers.”  Further, NCTO launched a new industry video campaign today that outlines steps the Biden administration and Congress must take to re-shore the production of personal protective equipment (PPE) and the entire supply chain for critical products. The video can be found here: MakeAmericanPPE.

National Council of Textile Organizations President and CEO Kim Glas said:
“We commend President Biden for taking action in his first days in office to strengthen our domestic supply chain and manufacturing base with a “Made in America” executive order directing the federal government to spend taxpayer dollars on American-made goods produced by American workers using American-made components.

Increasing the domestic procurement threshold and the price preferences for domestic goods under the current Buy American law will bolster domestic production and stimulate more investment in U.S. manufacturing.

We believe it is critical that taxpayer dollars are used to invest in American manufacturing and our workforce. It is essential that we close loopholes in our Buy America laws, expand application and product coverage of domestic content rules, and close unnecessary contract waivers that undermine American manufacturing and its workforce.
 
We look forward to working with the Biden administration and Congress on immediately strengthening our domestic procurement laws. The COVID-19 crisis was exacerbated when foreign supply chains broke down leaving our frontline workers vulnerable, underscoring the vital need for America to manufacture essential medical products at home. We look forward to working with the Biden administration on implementing this Executive Order, and with members of Congress to push critical bipartisan legislation to help ensure this onshoring effort is fully realized.

We also sincerely thank Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Representative Kathy Manning (D-NC) for their leadership in sending a recent letter to President Biden, requesting the president prioritize “Made in America” personal protective equipment (PPE) purchases and outlining key steps the administration can take to produce and procure quality American-made PPE for frontline workers.”

National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) President and CEO Kim Glas issued a statement today welcoming President Biden’s action plan and COVID-19 response, accompanied by a series of executive orders, including an order signed today to strengthen U.S. supply chains by directing federal agencies to use the Defense Production Act (DPA) to address shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) and related vaccine supplies.

“We are closely reviewing President Biden’s national strategic plan to confront the pandemic and welcome the executive order signed today to strengthen our supply chains by directing all federal agencies to use the Defense Production Act to address shortages of personal protective equipment, vaccine supplies and essential products. These are important steps that will help ramp up critical manufacturing of these essential PPE products and other critically needed supplies like tests and vaccines.”

American manufacturers have been at the forefront of the effort to build a domestic PPE supply chain since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The U.S. textile industry retooled production and operations virtually overnight, producing millions of face masks, isolation gowns, testing swabs and other critical medical textiles.

The industry is dedicated to making significant investments in automated equipment for PPE, but the industry needs long-term, multiyear contracts to help realize that investment.

The deployment of DPA is one of the critical tools that will help incentivize investment in equipment, propel the hiring of U.S. workers and expand these critical production chains.

Since its inception, the DPA has been utilized by the Department of Defense to make critical investments in domestic textile manufacturing infrastructure and capacity, creating private-public partnerships through the government’s capital investments under the DPA and guaranteeing purchases through long-term contracts.  

NCTO applaud President Biden’s action and anticipate further steps including a reported order that will seek to strengthen government procurement of U.S. products in the coming days. NCTO appreciate President Biden outlining the “National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness” a series of actions and steps the administration will undertake to deploy and manufacture the vaccine and other essential products.

Neumünster/Troisdorf, Germany, December 3, 2020 – just a few days ago, the second newly-delivered Oerlikon Nonwoven meltblown system was commissioned at Innovatec’s state-of-the-art machine park. With it, the nonwovens manufacturer – based in Troisdorf in North Rhine-Westphalia – immediately started producing polypropylene filter nonwovens: in particular for use in protective face masks, which have been increasingly in demand since the start of the coronavirus pandemic and whose domestic manufacture is being supported by the Ger-man Government. Here, the highly-efficient Oerlikon Nonwoven meltblown technology from Neumünster is supporting the production of these highly-effective filter media.

“Back in June 2020, Oerlikon Nonwoven delivered the first so-called 2-beam system to Innovatec”, reports Rainer Straub, Head of Oerlikon Nonwoven. Together with the second production line, the Troisdorf-based enterprise has been able to almost double its filter nonwoven output to date. The North Rhine-Westphalian company now has filter media production capacities that can be used to manufacture up to 2.5 billion operating room filter masks or a billion highly-effective FFP2 masks per year.

The, according to its own information, leading manufacturer of meltblown mask nonwovens in Europe is participating in the German Government’s ‘Nonwovens Production’ grant program to ramp up its output capacities and has for this reason already received a visit from top German politicians, including Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Peter Altmaier and North Rhine-Westphalia Minister President Armin Laschet. Together, politicians and industry want to ensure that the production capacities for protective equipment continue to grow in Germany and that above all critical supply chains are secured at both national and European levels. And companies such as Innovatec and Oerlikon Nonwoven are actively contributing towards this.

The U.S. International Trade Commission held a public hearing on September 23-24 as part of its investigation of conditions impacting U.S. industry sectors and supply chains in the production of medical goods related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) President & CEO Kim Glas is testifying on panel 5.

“Amid the devastating challenges of responding to COVID-19, NCTO members have been at the forefront of deploying manufacturing resources to address the critical need for personal protective equipment (PPE),” Glas said in testimony prepared for delivery.  “Our members quickly mobilized, proactively retooling production lines and retraining workers to provide U.S.-made PPE to frontline medical workers.”

“Despite these heroic efforts to confront the ongoing crisis, the onshoring of a permanent PPE industry will only materialize if proper government policies are implemented to incentivize the long-term investment needed to sustain PPE production in the United States,” Glas said.

Glas’ testimony as prepared for delivery can be found here.

• Members of TMAS – the Swedish textile machinery association – have adopted a range of new strategies in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, aimed at assisting manufacturers of textiles and apparel to adjust to a new normal, as Europe and other regions emerge cautiously from lockdown.

“Many European companies have been forced into testing new working methods and looking at what it’s possible to do remotely, and how to exploit automation to the full, in order to become more flexible,” says TMAS Secretary General Therese Premler-Andersson. “Others have been taking risks where they see opportunies and there’s a new sense of solidarity among companies.

“It’s extremely encouraging, for example, that over five hundred European companies from across our supply chain are reported to have responded to the shortages of facemasks and PPE – protective personal equipment – by converting parts of their sites or investing in new equipment.”

New supply chains

Amongst them are TMAS members of the ACG Group, who quickly established a dedicated new nonwovens fabric converting and single-use garment making-up plant to supply to the Swedish health authorities. From a standing start in March, this is now producing 1.8 million square metres of converted fabric and turning it into 692,000 finished medical garments each month.

“In 2020 so far, we have seen new value chains being created and a certain amount of permanent reshoring is now inevitable,” says Premler-Andersson. “This is being backed by the new funding announced in the European Union’s Next Generation EU plan, with €750 billion marked for helping industry recover. As the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has stressed, “green and digital” transitions hold the key to Europe’s future prosperity and resilience, and TMAS members have new solutions to assist in both areas.”

Remote working

Automated solutions have opened up many possibilities for remote working during the pandemic. Texo AB, for example, the specialist in wide-width weaving looms for the paper industry, was able to successfully complete the build and delivery of a major multi-container order between April and May.

“Our new Remote Guidance software now makes it possible for us to carry out some of the commissioning and troubleshooting of such new lines remotely, which has been helpful” says Texo AB President Anders Svensson.

Svegea of Sweden, which has spent the past few months developing its new CR-210 fabric relaxation machine for knitted fabrics, has also successfully set up and installed a number of machines remotely, which the company has never attempted before.

“The pandemic has definitely led to some inventive solutions for us and with international travel currently not possible, we are finding better methods of digital communication and collaboration all the time,” says Svegea managing director Hakan Steene.

Eric Norling, Vice President of the Precision Application business of Baldwin Technology, believes the pandemic may have a more permanent impact on global travel.

“We have now proven that e-meetings and virtual collaboration tools are effective,” he says. “Baldwin implemented a home office work regime from April with only production personnel and R&D researchers at the workplace. These past few months have shown that we can be just as effective and do not need to travel for physical meetings to the same extent that was previously thought to be necessary.”

Pär Hedman, Sales and Marketing Manager for IRO AB, however, believes such advances can only go so far at the moment.

“Video conferences have taken a big leap forward, especially in development projects, and this method of communication is here to stay, but it will never completely replace personal meetings,” he says. “And textile fabrics need to be touched, examined and accepted by the senses, which is impossible to do via digital media today. The coming haptic internet, however, may well even change that too.”

Social distancing

The many garment factories now equipped with Eton Systems UPS work stations – designed to save considerable costs through automation – have meanwhile benefited from the unintentional social distancing they automatically provide compared to factories with conventional banks of sewing machines.

“These companies have been able to continue operating throughout the pandemic due to the spaced nature of our automated plant configurations,” says Eton Systems Business Development Manager Roger Ryrlén. “The UPS system has been established for some time, but planned spacing has proved an accidental plus for our customers – with improved productivity.”

“Innovations from TMAS member companies have been coming thick and fast recently due to their advanced know-how in automation concepts,” Premler-Andersson concludes.  “If anything, the restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic have only accelerated these initiatives by obliging our members to take new approaches.”

National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) President and CEO Kim Glas issued a statement, urging the government to institute Buy American policy changes to help bolster U.S. manufacturers producing personal protective equipment (PPE) for frontline workers battling the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If the government is sincere about reconstituting a U.S. production chain for medical personal protective equipment (PPE) to resolve the drastic shortages we are experiencing during the current pandemic, it is going to have to make key policy changes to help incentivize domestic production. A strong Buy American mandate for these vital healthcare materials needs to be instituted for all federal agencies, coupled with other reasonable production incentives, to help ensure a strong U.S.  manufacturing base for these essential products.

Our government already has an existing example of such a mandate that serves as an excellent model. The U.S. Department of Defense operates under a fiber-to-finished product Buy American rule for military textiles. This rule ensures that the vital textile materials our U.S. warfighters depend upon, come from a secure domestic production chain that cannot be severed during a military emergency by offshore entities.

There is a bipartisan call for action as members of Congress on both sides of the aisle have begun to acknowledge the need for these types of reasonable and essential policy changes.

Anything short of fully instituting domestic purchase requirements through Executive Order and other legislative initiatives will ensure that PPE production through U.S. supply chains that have been created overnight don’t evaporate as soon as this crisis is over.  

In the midst of the crisis, our failure to confront this challenge will allow for a repeat of the sins of the past that allowed sourcing agents to offshore the entire production of medical PPE in search of lucrative profits. While chasing the lowest cost import may have seemed cost effective at the time, these past few months have demonstrated that we paid a deadly price through this approach by jeopardizing the very lives of frontline medical personnel that are fighting the pandemic.   

This is a national security issue. It’s also a vital healthcare issue and it is decision time for U.S. policymakers. If our country is to be prepared for future deadly pandemics such as the one it is now facing, reasonable policy changes need to be implemented to ensure that we strengthen our domestic supply chain to address America’s security, safety and healthcare requirements.”

NCTO is a Washington, DC-based trade association that represents domestic textile manufacturers, including artificial and synthetic filament and fiber producers. 

The National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO), representing the full spectrum of U.S. textiles from fiber through finished products, issued a statement from NCTO President and CEO Kim Glas today, voicing concern over the administration’s executive order instituting a non-reciprocal 90-day deferral on certain tariffs.
The temporary postponement of duties does not apply to products with antidumping or countervailing duties or those products subject to penalty duties under Section 232, 201 and 301.

“At a time when domestic textile producers and its workforce have mobilized to transform their production lines to manufacture the personal protective equipment (PPE) supplies for frontline healthcare and medical workers fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, the administration’s decision to defer duties for 90 days on the vast majority of products imported into the United States is counterproductive.
This move contradicts the administration’s top stated priority of rebuilding American manufacturing and buying American and could have severe negative implications for the entire U.S. textile industry, whose companies and workforce already are facing enormous economic hardship.
We support the need to temporarily eliminate barriers to the entry of emergency medical supplies and certain PPE inputs tied directly to the COVID-19 response. But make no mistake, the key drivers behind efforts to defer tariffs have nothing to do with facilitating access to PPE products or stopping the spread of COVID-19.
Our industry is being asked to do extraordinary things.  We are heeding that call, but we need help to ensure the supply chains we are creating overnight don’t evaporate tomorrow.  We need strong procurement policies and additional funding for our industries to ramp up and retool – not further measures that incentivize offshore production. We need to maximize the U.S. domestic production chain right now to every extent possible in helping fight COVID-19 and make the products American frontline workers desperately need.  

We need to provide immediate and substantial relief to our manufacturing sector and their workforce who are suffering enormously right now. It’s critical that we have a long-term U.S. government plan to ensure that we aren’t relying on offshore producers to make medically necessary, live-saving PPE.  We shouldn’t be providing handouts to reward the very companies that helped offshore these industries so many years ago.

Tariffs are one of the few mechanisms in place to help partially address the challenges U.S. manufacturers face in competing with imports from countries with exceptionally low wages, poor working conditions, and minimal environmental and safety standards.”, states the NCTO.

Amid the rapid spread of COVID-19 around the world, DyStar’s global operations continue to adapt to the development of the situation and to mitigate potential risks or impacts across the business. While the trajectory is unknown, DyStar is guided by recommendations from the World Health Organization and the local government authorities, to proactively address situations that could possibly affect our people and customers. This is to ensure that we have effective plans and standard procedures to minimize the disruption of our global operations.

Business Continuity Plan (BCP)
As a globally operating company, each of our operating sites, manufacturing plants, offices have a Business Continuity Plan (BCP) in place to sustain our operations and the supply chains we serve. The BCP, owned by our Business Continuity Management Team, provides clear guidance for all local operations, such as Administration, Customer Services, Finance, Logistics Services, Sales and Technical Support as well as Procurement, to enable all functions to continue operating effectively to serve our customers, distributors and agents.

Emergency Response Plan (ERP)
DyStar’s manufacturing sites are also installed with an Emergency Response Procedure to cover all emergency circumstances, including the COVID-19 pandemic disease. The goal of the emergency response procedure is to mitigate the impact of such events on people and the environment, ensuring operational readiness of the site during an emergency.

As the world adjusts to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, DyStar will continue to monitor the situation very closely and will provide updates that adapt to the changing situation. We remain committed to provide our customers with excellent service and to work closely with all our partners throughout this difficult period.