There are around 6,000 garment factories in Bangladesh RMG industry, which directly or indirectly employ about 3 million people. Bangladeshi apparel industry is facing acute manpower dearth, which has become a troubling issue for the industry as it leaves over 30% of production capacity inoperative. Due to the impact of economic slowdown, RMG industry of the country, which is the highest foreign currency generator industry, is still witnessing negative export trend.

Number of sewing machine operators is decreasing, against the number of machines in RMG factories, owing to which large number of sewing machines which remain idle.

BGMEA President Abdus Salam Murshedy said labour shortage is a common problem for every factory. In some cases some workers leave a factory to raise pay by only Tk 100. As per the factory owners, manpower shortage has become an enduring problem for these factories as every month around 30% of the factory workers shift to other factories looking for salary hike.

In addition to this, limited number of training institutes for garment factories offer fewer skilled and semi skilled workers  each year, against the requirement of large number of workers.

The highest foreign currency earning industry is still experiencing negative export performance as the globe is yet to come out from the effect of financial recession.

During the July-December period of the current fiscal year export earnings from knitwear, woven garments, home textile and textile fabrics registered fall by 5.66%, 7.86%, 16.48% and 18.16% respectively compared to corresponding period of previous fiscal. The overall export of the country experienced 7.70% fall in December, 2009.

The government targeted to export woven garment products worth $6.69 billion and knitwear worth $7.30 billion for the current fiscal year. The export of woven and knitwear items contributes more than 80% in the total export volume of Bangladesh.