EU buys $525 mln worth of clothes from Ukraine in 2015

Sunday, June 12, 2016 - 22:53 (EEST) Section: Latest news

The European Union was the major buyer of Ukrainian-made clothes in 2015, accounting for 90.5% of clothes shipments from Ukraine to the tune of $525 million, according to the Europeiska Pravda online newspaper.
It cited data of state enterprise UkrPromZovnishEkspertyza, or the Ukrainian Industry Expertise (UEX), a leading company that studies Ukrainian and international markets, and prepares decisions on business development as well as industry and industrial policy research.
International trade in clothes grows by 4% per annum on the average, but the share of Ukraine on the international clothes market in the past five years has shrunk to 0.10% from 0.16%, the newspaper reported.
Almost 90% of Ukrainian exports were cooperation on a tolling basis. It was 88% in 2013 ($583 million) and 89% in 2014 ($566 million).
Outwear accounted for 64.3% ($285.6 million) of Ukrainian clothes exports and the share of underwear was 17.4%, or $77.4 million, UEX reported.
”In recent years, major buyers of clothes made in Ukraine are the European Union (90.5%, or $525 million) and Russia (5.6%, or $33 million). A trend towards a reduction in Russia`s share in total exports amid the growth of the EU`s share is noticeable now,” UEX said.
Major importers of Ukraine`s clothes are Germany ($161 million), Hungary ($32 million), Italy ($31 million), Poland ($30 million), which all together accounted for almost 57% of exports from Ukraine in 2015.
Ukrainian clothes producers say that the most promising are European countries that not only import much but also demonstrate a considerable pace of growth of demand for imports.
Among them are Luxembourg (+20% per annum), Poland (+15.4%), Latvia (+12.9%), Slovakia (+12.5%), Lithuania (+12.4%), Spain (+9.2%), Bulgaria (+9%), and the Netherlands (+8.1%).