Korean, Taiwanese textile industries to enhance supply chain

[Photo provided by The Korea Federation of Textile Industries]

Leaders in South Korea and Taiwan’s textile and fashion industries expressed their joint commitment to enhancing cooperation in supply chains. Choi Byung-oh, Chairman of the Korea Federation of Textile Industries (KOFOTI), and Guo Shaoyi, Chairman of the Taiwan Textile Federation, unveiled their intentions during an interview with Maeil Business Newspaper on Thursday, at the 18th annual Korea-Taiwan Textile Industry Conference held at the Westin Chosun Hotel in Busan.

“We will push for meetings related to the textile and apparel industries involving Korea, Taiwan, and Japan,” Choi told the newspaper. For his part, Guo stressed, “Formal industry exchanges among Korea, Taiwan, and Japan ceased after 2000. The time to restart is now.”

The 2024 edition of the annual conference, which was attended by 84 industry representatives from both Korea and Taiwan, is the first event held since Choi and Guo took the helms at their respective textile industry associations.

During the conference, the duo shared their concerns about China flooding the global textile manufacturing ecosystem with unsold inventory of textiles and apparel amid trade tensions with the United States. They also highlighted the issue of Chinese e-commerce companies such as Alibaba’s AliExpress accelerating their global expansions, leading to the unrestricted flow of products across borders without tariffs.

“China is disrupting not only the World Trade Organization (WTO) but also free trade agreements (FTA) made by various countries by indiscriminately pushing out low-priced products that have not been verified for safety and are produced unfairly,” Choi said. “In particular, there are concerns within the industry about non-tariff items from Chinese e-commerce entities such as Ali, Temu, and Shein, with discussions currently underway on how to address them.”

In Taiwan, concerns about the disruption caused by Chinese e-commerce platform Taobao, which sells low-priced goods without tariffs, had been ongoing for several years. “Retailers buying cheap products from Taobao and reselling them has led to increased tax evasion issues. In response, the industry requested the government to impose tariffs on local retailers when they purchase goods from such platforms multiple times,” Guo explained.

Both parties also exchanged in-depth opinions on global textile and fashion industry issues such as the trade dispute between the United States and China, geopolitical risks in Russia and the Middle East, and the mandatory disclosure of ESG (environmental, social, and governance) practices. They also discussed cooperation strategies to elevate the status of the currently stagnant textile industry.

“Korea and Taiwan are global manufacturing powerhouses with many production bases in Asia, Africa, and Latin America,” Choi said.

“We are actively transitioning to high-value-added advanced materials industries and are promoting innovations to quickly establish new manufacturing and distribution structures such as eco-friendly textile technology and waste resource recycling,” Guo added.