The garment industry is a cornerstone of essential consumer goods, enhancing quality of life while playing a vital role in livelihoods. It reflects human creativity, technological progress, and social evolution. Currently, there are over 170,000 garment companies in China, employing over 20 million people. In 2023, domestic apparel sales exceeded CNY4.5 trillion, with exports totaling USD159.1 billion. China stands as the world’s largest producer and exporter of clothing and boasts a vast consumer market.
Over the past 40 years, China's garment industry has experienced remarkable growth, driven by the rapid expansion of the economy and evolving consumer demands. This development is supported by an innovative entrepreneurial spirit, a skilled workforce, a robust industrial ecosystem, and a highly efficient supply chain. The industry's market-oriented and innovative nature continuously fuels enhancements in product quality, creativity, technology, branding, marketing, and service.
China's apparel production is primarily concentrated in regions such as the Pearl River Delta, Yangtze River Delta, Bohai Rim, and the southeastern coastal areas. The five eastern coastal provinces—Shandong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong—account for over 70% of the nation's total output. The apparel sector stands out for its strong clustering tendencies, with industrial clusters leveraging optimized resource allocation to drive regionally concentrated, efficient, and scaled development. Currently, over 60 influential apparel industrial clusters have been established nationwide, each characterized by specific product categories. The industry continues to optimize its resource allocation and capacity layout, advancing internationalization and extending its reach from the eastern coastal regions to central and western China, as well as emerging economies.
Decades of accumulated production management experience, continuous technological upgrades, and the transformation of modern manufacturing systems, particularly through the integration of artificial intelligence, are propelling rapid advancements in intelligent, green, collaborative, and service-oriented manufacturing of China’s apparel industry. This evolution establishes multi-layered, diverse R&D and a manufacturing advantage of high-quality products. Additionally, against the backdrop of rising domestic demand, numerous outstanding Chinese original apparel brands have emerged, excelling in lifestyle exploration, product innovation, cultural leadership, and organizational management. These brands are not only gaining consumer recognition but also driving significant industrial upgrading.
As the industry evolves, it is shifting from a labor-intensive model to one that emphasizes technology and knowledge. This transformation occurs within a context of global cultural integration, aiming to establish a fashion value system rooted in the rich heritage of Chinese culture. The apparel industry is also advancing a new era of industrial and commercial civilization in the digital economy, emphasizing human-centric responsibilities, integrity, and green practices.
Today, as consumption upgrades and technological transformations unfold, the Chinese apparel industry is redefining its focus around "technology, fashion, and green" principles. Committed to the philosophy of "innovation, coordination, green, openness, and sharing", it is accelerating the development of high-quality productivity and modern industrial systems. By deepening collaborative innovation across the creative, value, and industrial chains, the industry has entered a new chapter of high-quality development. As global economic integration deepens, international win-win cooperation is becoming the mainstream approach. The Chinese apparel industry is poised to embrace more innovative concepts, adopt a more open stance, and foster extensive and in-depth international collaborations, driving new growth alongside the global apparel sector.
