LOW WAGES IN THE TEXTILE SECTOR WONT MAKE IT MORE COMPETITIVE – MINISTER DAVIES

LOW WAGES IN THE TEXTILE SECTOR WONT MAKE IT MORE COMPETITIVE – MINISTER DAVIES

The Minister of Trade and Industry, Dr Rob Davies says paying workers low wages in the textile sector won’t make it more competitive and desirable in advancing manufacturing in the country. The minister was speaking at the Prestige Clothing Factory which is the manufacturing arm of Foschini in Cape Town today.

Minister Davies visited Prestige Clothing Factory and Damen Shipyards Group. The visits were part of “Taking the dtito the Factories” campaign. The campaign is aimed at offering the political leadership of the department an opportunity to interact with directors of companies which have received funding from Department of Trade and Industry, (the dti) in order to assess the impact of the financial support.

Davies said even though the sector still remains a challenge and export had gone down over the years, the government had put a number of measures in place like (duty credit certificate schemes, tariff reduction, etc).

“In order to address these challenges in the sector the dti introduced the Clothing and Textiles Competitiveness Programme which had had a big impact so far including the saving of the 69000 stable jobs. The programme has also been responsible for the introduction of the vertical cluster through the Competitive Improvement Programme (CIP). The Foschini Group was the first big retailer to embrace the dti CIP concept by forming the first vertical ordinary cluster which was formed and approved in April 2011,” said Davies.

Davies added that The Foschini Fast Fashion Cluster was valued at a total cost of R32 791 604 of which R 24 593 703 was funded through the CIP whilst 8 197 901 was their contribution and the other comes from the industry itself.

“Total funds allocated to the second phase was R 32 780 550 of which R 8 195 138 is the consortium contribution whilst the CIP contribution is R 24 585 412. This has shown that as a retail group, Foschini is currently leading in terms of a vertical cluster that has value chain representation,” he said

Davies also said there is a fabric rebate discussion on the textile sector as a whole that will take into account all challenges that have been threatening the sector over the years.