From A Fiber To The Final Garment, China Has Formed The Most Complete Textile Industry Chain in The World

From a fiber to the final garment, China has formed the most complete textile industry chain in the world

Manufacturing is the foundation of a country's economy and the focus of international competition. In recent years, China's manufacturing industry has made great progress. Many products not only occupy the domestic market that was originally dominated by imported products, but also have many competitiveness in the international market. From May 15th, the "Focus Interview" of China Central Radio and Television Station will broadcast the series "Password of Leading", focusing on those industries and industries in my country's manufacturing industry that have quietly accumulated and exerted efforts and become leaders in the domestic and international markets.

Let us focus on the traditional industry of "textile".

Textile is a traditional industry and an indispensable part of the national economy. From a fiber to the final garment, China has formed the most complete textile industry chain in the world, and has gradually grown from a big country in the textile industry to a strong country in the global textile industry. What kind of industry development leading password is hidden behind this?

Smart Transformation

"Thousands of yarn, 10,000 cloth" become history

my country's annual total fiber processing accounts for more than 50% of the world's total. In 2021, textile and apparel exports will reach 316 billion US dollars, accounting for one-third of the world's total. At present, the retail scale of China's clothing market exceeds 4.5 trillion yuan. Supporting these huge numbers is China's textile industry chain, which is the world's largest, most complete, and constantly transforming and upgrading.

With the reform and opening up, especially after China's entry into the World Trade Organization in the early 21st century, the textile industry has released huge production capacity, providing a steady stream of cheap and high-quality clothing to the world. But at the same time, China's textile industry has ushered in a new era. "Our body is already very large, and it is unlikely that it will run faster." Sun Huaibin, vice president and spokesman of China National Textile and Apparel Council, said that in the face of changes in the market environment, comprehensive cost pressure, environmental protection Due to a series of factors such as pressure and rising labor costs, China's textile industry must transform and upgrade, and develop from big to strong.

Today, the scene of "thousands of yarns, ten thousand people's cloth" in textile enterprises has become history. In a high-end new type of special yarn production plant in Zaozhuang, Shandong, only 35 people are needed to produce 10,000 spindles. More than 30 years ago, there were 10,000 people in a factory with 100,000 spindles, which is equivalent to 1,000 people for 10,000 spindles.

In a huge automated warehouse in Changshu, Jiangsu, a piece of clothing can be locked in 3 minutes, and a courier slip is automatically attached and sent to a transport vehicle. The single-day throughput of the entire storage area can reach up to 1 million pieces, and the handling, sorting, distribution, and inventory inventory are all completed by robots.

Li Lingshen, vice president of China National Textile and Apparel Council and deputy director of the National Textile Standardization Technical Committee, said, "After several years of industry digitization, networking, and intelligent iterative upgrading, the labor productivity, intelligent manufacturing level and digital service level of the entire industry have improved. All have been greatly improved, and labor productivity has been greatly improved.”

Differentiated route to make products that others can't do

Accelerate towards a higher end of the industrial chain

Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, my country's economy has shifted from a high-speed growth stage to a high-quality development stage, and the production mode of the textile industry has undergone revolutionary changes. A group of innovative textile enterprises have accelerated their progress towards the higher end of the industrial chain through transformation and upgrading.

Microfibers are widely used in high-end clothing, high-performance filter materials, clean materials and other fields. The "island microfiber" developed by a Chinese company from laboratory research and development to industrialized mass production has a diameter of only 1/100 of a human hair, and 2,664 monofilaments are distributed inside. A microfiber monofilament weighing 112 grams can circle the earth's equator once. The company's annual output of microfiber products has accounted for about 60% of the world's total.

Adhering to the differentiated route and making products that others cannot do is the key for this company to go from following to the industry leader. The company uses recycled plastic bottles to produce recycled fibers, which can produce 250,000 tons of recycled fibers a year and digest 12.5 billion waste plastic bottles. In 2020, the company took the lead in establishing the National Advanced Functional Fiber Innovation Center, which is also the first national innovation center led by a private enterprise in the country.

In April 2022, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on the High-Quality Development of the Chemical Fiber Industry", proposing to build a high-end, intelligent and green modern fiber industry system by 2025, and comprehensively build a chemical fiber powerhouse. "Chemical fiber is the most important part of textile fiber materials. my country's chemical fiber production accounts for more than 70% of the world's total." Li Lingshen said that the high-quality development of the chemical fiber industry is directly related to the sustainability of the entire textile industry. The security of development and industrial chain and supply chain is controllable.

With "technology, green, fashion"

Responding to people from dressing warmly to dressing well

At the end of 2020, the Chinese Academy of Engineering organized a number of academicians and experts to compare and analyze my country's 26 manufacturing industries and manufacturing powerhouses. This also means that the goal of my country's textile power has been basically achieved. This is a milestone for the textile industry to promote high-quality development through transformation and upgrading.

Technology, greenness, and fashion are the industrial orientations for the high-quality development of my country's textile industry. The high-quality development in the production field of the textile industry responds to the increasingly wealthy Chinese people's pursuit of changing from dressing warmly to dressing well and dressing well.

A custom clothing company in Dalian, apart from offline stores, a large part of its sales come from online orders. Consumers can not only choose fabrics and participate in style design online, but also realize remote measurement. They only need to take photos as required to intelligently display the size data of collar circumference, waist circumference and other parts.

Personalized customization and flexible production meet people's diverse needs for clothing, giving birth to a large number of niche brands and more imagination. The new format of live e-commerce has brought great changes to the traditional model of the clothing industry from design to production, from wholesale to retail.

Beyond the traditional concept of "clothing and quilting the world"

Become an important means of "weaving the world"

Under the guidance of the new development concept, my country's textile industry is not only growing bigger and stronger in all aspects, undergoing transformation and upgrading, but also expanding the application fields involved in the textile industry.

From functional sportswear for Winter Olympic athletes, to special aerospace equipment and materials, to "bag dust removal" filtration technology used in industrial dust and air pollution control, today's textile industry has gone far beyond the traditional sense of "clothing and quilting" concept, and become an important means of weaving the world. With the continuous expansion of application fields, and high-end, intelligent, green, etc. becoming the foothold of enterprises, we also have unlimited imagination for the future of China's textile industry.