One in every five sweaters globally comes from Dalang Town in Dongguan, Guangdong. This small Pearl River Delta town produces over 900 million garments annually, with its entire industrial chain generating more than 72 billion RMB in transactions. At the recently concluded 95th International Wool Textile Conference, Dalang, as the host, showcased the scale and transformation momentum of China's wool textile industrial cluster to global peers.
Data Behind Industry Resilience
Data disclosed by Sun Ruizhe, President of the China National Textile and Apparel Council, at the conference deserves attention. From January to April this year, revenue of textile enterprises above designated size fell 0.3% year-on-year, but total profit surged 19.3%, with a profit margin of 2.9%. This indicates that the industry improved efficiency under pressure rather than relying solely on scale expansion. During the same period, retail sales of clothing, shoes, hats, and knitwear by units above designated size totaled 512.13 billion RMB, up 8.1% year-on-year, accelerating by 5 percentage points from the previous year, providing demand support for upstream fabric and yarn sectors.
From an investment perspective, divergence is clear. From January to May, fixed asset investment in the textile industry grew 10.8% year-on-year, while investment in the garment and chemical fiber industries fell 10.3% and 14.5%, respectively. This reflects capital concentration in textile manufacturing, particularly in smart and green upgrades, while expansion in garment processing and chemical fiber capacity is slowing. On the export front, total textile and apparel exports reached $116.73 billion, up 0.1% year-on-year, with textile exports rising 1.7% and apparel exports falling 1.6%, showing intermediate goods outperforming finished products.
Intelligent Economy Reshaping Wool Value Chain
The conference theme 'Smart Weaving the Future: Wool's Health and Digital Life' is not just a slogan. Sun Ruizhe cited concrete examples: Yueda Textile's 'Lighthouse Factory' reduced spindle workers by 70%, boosted labor productivity fourfold, cut energy consumption by 15%, and lowered processing costs by 26% through smart manufacturing. Semir's AI-assisted design system improved overall design efficiency by 35% and pattern design efficiency by over 200%. Bosideng's 'AI Aesthetic Brain' reduced sample development costs by over 60%. These figures mean the entire wool textile chain—from spinning, weaving to design and marketing—is undergoing a data-driven efficiency revolution.
AI's penetration goes beyond production. Anoky has built an ecosystem from dyes to inkjet printing, AI design, and IP cultural creativity. Wool enterprises stuck in traditional 'order-produce-ship' models will soon lose competitiveness in cost and response speed. For buyers, supplier selection criteria are shifting: not just capacity and price, but digital capability, flexible manufacturing, and data asset accumulation matter.
Transformation Sample from Regional Industrial Cluster
Dalang's case offers a reference for other wool clusters. As a specialized town born from reform and opening-up, its agglomeration effect is clear: the entire industrial chain's annual transaction volume exceeds 72 billion RMB, meaning efficient synergy from raw material procurement, yarn processing, garment manufacturing to market sales at every link. But scale alone is not a moat; Dalang is leveraging smart manufacturing, digital design, and green dyeing to convert scale into quality advantages.
Unlike Keqiao or Shengze fabric clusters, Dalang's core category is wool knitwear, with a shorter chain, faster style turnover, and higher seasonal sensitivity. Thus, AI applications in design sampling, inventory management, and demand forecasting are critical for Dalang enterprises. Conference information revealed that some Dalang companies have deployed AI-driven fast-response supply chains, cutting sample cycles from an average of seven days to two days.
Constants and Variables in Global Supply Chains
The IMF has lowered its 2026 global growth forecast to 3.1%, with geopolitical conflicts, energy volatility, and shipping disruptions constantly disturbing global textile supply chains. Yet China's textile industry has maintained exports over $300 billion for six consecutive years, with strong intermediate goods exports like chemical fibers and fabrics, underscoring its 'ballast stone' role in the global textile supply chain. Sun Ruizhe noted that China's annual fiber processing volume exceeds 60 million tons, and annual garment output exceeds 70 billion pieces, both accounting for over 50% of the global share. This scale advantage is hard to replace in the short term.
However, challenges are real. Fixed asset investment in the garment industry fell 10.3%, and in the chemical fiber industry fell 14.5%, indicating capacity relocation or contraction. For wool enterprises, maintaining scale while transitioning to high-end, smart, and green models will determine competitiveness in the next decade.