Textiles industry booming as demand for face masks rockets

BANGKOK, 23 July 2009 (NNT) – The textiles industry has reported a boom due to concern over swine flu, driving up the demand for face masks to novel heights.

Director of the Thailand Textile Institute Wirat Tandechanurat said textiles workers were currently experiencing a period of flourishment as the threat of influenza A (H1N1) had greatly hiked the need for cloth face masks. Many producers have reported not being able to keep up with orders and having to run production over time to keep up with consumers.

The sudden spike has been especially helpful to the small and medium enterprise sector of the textiles industry which was previously on the brink of folding. Countries such as China, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka have placed orders to Thailand for face masks that will provide demand until the latter end of the year.

According to the director, consumers prefer face masks produced in Thailand to those from China, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka.