The silk industry, which is mainly oriented towards foreign trade imports, shuddered after encountering the unprecedented boom in the European and American markets. The reshuffle and research within the industry are booming, and the ancient silk industry is struggling to move forward in the baptism of the times.
When the storm hits, expanding the domestic market share and expanding the international market have become the rules for the industry to save itself. In addition, adding product added value, giving silk fabrics more scientific and technological content, separating them from emerging civilized creative industries, opening up the civilized gift market and the decorative fabric market… these have become successful cases for silk companies to be proud of the world.
“Seven big mountains” are pressing down
According to Cai Gaosheng, chairman of Guangdong Silk Textile Group, currently, companies are facing “seven big mountains” of pressure. This is a microcosm of the dilemma commonly faced by the silk industry.
First, the international market demand is sluggish and orders have increased significantly; secondly, companies are facing a variety of favorable factors such as high raw material costs, falling labor costs, rising interest rates, tight funds, and labor shortages; initially, the depreciation of the RMB has also Tightened business costs.
Raw materials account for a high proportion of the cost of the silk industry, but the price of cocoon silk fluctuates greatly, and the price of cocoon silk is upside down, making the company’s situation worse. “The price of silkworm cocoons fell from 1,200 yuan/ton at the end of last year to 1,800 yuan/ton, an increase of 50%; while the price of factory silk dropped from 230,000 yuan/ton at the end of last year to 420,000 yuan/ton, and dropped sharply to 310,000 yuan/ton in early July this year. Yuan/ton, the fluctuation range is as high as 109%, and the purchase price has not increased proportionally, resulting in the price of cocoon silk being temporarily upside down. Most customers are waiting and waiting, making transactions difficult.” Cai Gaosheng described the industry’s plight with a set of figures. “In this round of violent price fluctuations, many small businesses that relied on low-cost cooperation were unable to survive and have closed down.” An industry insider revealed.
Cai Gaosheng also pointed out that due to the heavy rest intensity of front-line workers in the silk industry, their wages increased from 2,400 yuan/month last year to 3,000 yuan/month in previous years, an increase of 25%. However, they still face recruitment difficulties and there is a labor shortage in general factories. Up to 10%~20%.
It is understood that the employment panic mainly comes from the impact of the chemical fiber industry. There are 2,700 textile companies in Shengze Town, the “silk capital”, among which the chemical fiber and cotton textile industries are developing rapidly. At the same time, silk companies have shown a shrinking trend, and their proportion has dropped to less than 1%. The battle for skilled workers in the chemical fiber industry is intensifying, and the loss of workers is accelerating the decline of small and medium-sized silk enterprises.
Due to the decline in labor costs, China’s silk advantage has weakened compared with Southeast Asian countries, and orders have flowed to Bangladesh, Indonesia, Cambodia and other countries.
When talking about the impact of the depreciation of the RMB, Cai Gaosheng also made a calculation: “The RMB has depreciated by 4.1% this year, with a cumulative depreciation of 0.27 yuan. Calculated based on the import of US$3.3 billion from January to September, the RMB The depreciation has caused the company to increase its income by 891 million yuan, and the company’s cost space has been further squeezed, making production operations difficult.” “The environment for companies is more difficult than during the 2008 financial crisis. It is estimated that the fourth quarter of this year and the next quarter will be The operating situation cannot be pessimistic,” he said.
To this end, Cai Gaosheng proposed the following initiatives: First, maintain the stability of foreign economic and trade policies such as the RMB exchange rate, import tax rebates, and import credit security, and continue to support enterprises to “come in.” Accelerate import tax rebates and solve the problems left over from the history of tax rebates; secondly, increase efforts to support the development of the cocoon and silk industry, increase the intensity of national factory silk reserves, support the central government to develop factory silk trade reserves, stabilize the sharp fluctuations in raw materials, and continue to increase the use of cocoons. Assistance from agricultural enterprises at the source of silk; third, support technological changes in the silk industry through interest discounts and other methods.
Domestic demand has become the new engine of the silk industry
Di Jiankai, Director of the Market Operation and Consumption Promotion Department of the Ministry of Commerce and Director of the National Cocoon and Silk Office, recently pointed out that affected by the international financial crisis, my country’s response to the United States, India, The scale of silk trade in major import markets such as Japan and South Korea has declined. my country’s silk industry relies on imports to face challenges.
At the same time, with the steady improvement of international consumption levels, the potential of the international market has been continuously released. Silk home textiles, silk knitwear, silk jewelry and silk blended rubber products have become market-leading products, and the proportion of export sales has exceeded 35%, an increase of 10 percentage points from 2005. The huge potential of the international market has given the silk industry hope.
In fact, as early as 2001, the silk industry began its structural transformation journey and actively explored the international consumer market.
Wanshili Group has long been focused on foreign trade, with a yearly import volume of more than one billion US dollars. However, since the “Tenth Five-Year Plan” period, that is, in 2001, the company began to consider transformation and focus on opening up the international market. Tu Hongyan, chairman of the company, said that during the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” period, it is expected that the domestic and foreign markets will each account for half of the country, and the silk industry’s output value will exceed 2.5 billion. Export sales will focus on fabrics, gifts, professional attire, and low-level fashion customization.
Tu Hongyan said: “Doing foreign trade is very painful.” The production cycle of an order is two months, during which the RMB exchange rate is”Pearls and pearls, the house is full of Luoqi, and it is luxurious” has been vividly reflected in the silk concept club “West Lake 1138” manufactured by Hangzhou Wanshili Group. The club uses a large amount of silk as decorative materials, creating a strong classical cultural atmosphere. Wanshili strongly advocates “high-quality silk changes life” and integrates silk into the creative cultural industry, playing a new style of transformation and upgrading.
Tu Hongyan, executive chairman of the board of directors of Wanshili Group, said that product awareness determines the business model. From “silk is fabric” to “silk is cultural gift” and then to “silk is new material”, Wanshili has explored the transformation and upgrading path of “traditional industry + cultural creativity + high technology = emerging industry”.
First of all, Wanshili has opened up the virgin territory of China’s silk culture gift market. Taking silk culture as the guide, it controls all aspects of design, materials, technology, packaging, marketing and other aspects, and creates a new product category. “Silk culture products last year Sales increased by 125% and cost rate increased by 150%. “Wen Li, general manager of Wansili Silk Products Co., Ltd. said.
The second idea is to exploit the environmental protection attributes of silk, operate silk as a decorative material, and open up the field of silk art soft decoration products. “Currently we In the international market, gifts and fabrics are already the main products and may be decoration in the future. The entire stucco materials market has an output value of nearly 300 billion, and the market potential is huge. “Wenli said.
The third category is to explore the artistic value of silk and inherit the millennium silk weaving skills. The reporter saw in the Wanshili product exhibition hall that Yun brocade, Su brocade, Kesi and other techniques are used In the production of silk paintings, they are extremely complicated and clumsy, which is impressive. As the saying goes, “the colorful and wonderful words are hidden in each other, and the flowers are uncertain when you turn to the side.” “In clothing, fabrics, cultural gifts, books, paintings, and even wallpapers, curtains, stools and other carriers, old silk has been given new life.
Tu Hongyan said that based on the silk cultural industry, everything will be beneficial The international market has exceeded 50% and will continue to increase steadily in the future. At the same time, general orders from European and American countries have been transferred to India, Vietnam and other countries, and the possibility of coming back is very small. Tu Hongyan expressed a sober understanding of this: “Five years ago, we predicted this situation. We are still very confident in deep processing, because our core advantage lies in design, otherwise, it will be no different from ordinary labor-intensive enterprises. “
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