Latest statistics provided by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology showed that China textile industry realized 68.1 billion yuan (10 billion US dollars) in fixed-assets investment during the first four months of 2009, with a year-on-year increase of 1.6 percent, and the growth rate was 16 percentage points slower than the year-earlier level.

By sectors, the amount put in textile manufacturing sector totaled 38.1 billion yuan during January-April period, posting a slight decline from last year´s numbers, of which, spinning, weaving and dyeing & finishing sector of cotton and man-made fibers witnessed fixed-assets investment down 3.5 percent year-on-year, wool spinning, dyeing and printing sector down 4.2 percent, textile product manufacturing sector down 1.9 percent compared with the same period of last year; the amount put in chemical fiber manufacturing sector decreased by 16.8 percent to 6.3 billion yuan while that of garment sector recorded investment up 12.5 percent to 22.3 billion yuan.

By regional structure of investment, central and western region still saw faster growth rate than that of eastern region. Jiangsu province ranked the first place in term of fixed-assets investment volume, followed by Shandong and Henan province. Seven provinces around China witnessed investment growth rate exceeding 50 percent including Shanxi, Jilin, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hainan, Shaanxi and Gansu province, of which, Jilin topped the list as it recorded investment up 189 percent year-on-year, followed by Jiangxi (+82%), Anhui(+59%), while other nine provinces or regions experienced sharp investment decline during the same period, namely, Tianjin, Shanghai, Shandong, Hubei, Guangdong, Yunnan, Ningxia, Qinghai and Xinjiang. Guangdong province led the decline with a year-on-year decrease of 34 percent; Shandong and Zhejiang down 28 percent and 26 percent, respectively.

Source: China Textile Leader