In the last financial year, Bangladesh’s leather industry registered a total of 797.6 million US dollars’ worth of exporting revenue, which represented a decline of 21.79% over the performance in similar period last year. The leather industry missed the target set for the period by 27.03%.

Finished leather exports generated 98.31 million US dollars, down by 40.28% from similar period in the previous fiscal year, and missing the target set for the period by 40.42%. Leather goods contributed with 220.55 million US dollars, down by 10.81% from the performance in the previous fiscal year, and also missing the target set (by 11.07%). Leather footwear exports registered a decline of 21.24%, generating 478.75 million US dollars over the period. Leather footwear is the category contributing the most to the exports revenue of the leather industry with a 60.00% share.

Revenue generated by exports of other footwear (277.13 million US dollars) increased slightly by 2.06% compared to the previous year, but also performing below the target set for the category (-13.40%).

The industry in 2018

According to the 2019 World Footwear Yearbook (AVAILABLE HERE) in 2018 Bangladesh was the 6^th largest footwear producer (461 million pairs). The manufacturing industry in the Asian country is much orientated to the internal market with only 69 million pairs exported in 2018 (making this the 20^th largest exporter of footwear).

Bangladesh’s financial year runs from July to June

Image credits: Pat Whelen on Unsplash