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Gildan makes plans to minimize impact of Haitian earthquake

Gildan Activewear is trying to fully evaluate the impact of Tuesday afternoon's magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti, on the operations and employees of its sub-contractors in the country. Gildan has no vertically-integrated manufacturing facilities in Haiti, but uses third party contractors to sew the majority of the fabric produced at its Dominican Republic textile facility. Initial indications are that two out of the three contractor facilities used by Gildan ar

13th January 2010

Knitting Industry
 |  Montréal

Knitted Outerwear

Gildan Activewear is trying to fully evaluate the impact of Tuesday afternoon's magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti, on the operations and employees of its sub-contractors in the country.

Gildan has no vertically-integrated manufacturing facilities in Haiti, but uses third party contractors to sew the majority of the fabric produced at its Dominican Republic textile facility. Initial indications are that two out of the three contractor facilities used by Gildan are intact, while the third and smallest contractor facility has suffered substantial damage. The company’s textile and sewing facilities in the Dominican Republic have not been affected by the earthquake.

Gildan’s Dominican Republic / Haiti manufacturing hub is currently dedicated to supplying a portion of the Company’s basic T-shirt requirements for the U.S. screen print market. The company says it is in a strong inventory position and is immediately implementing contingency plans to minimize likely short-term disruption of contractor production in Haiti. This will be done by increasing production at its integrated sewing facilities in the Dominican Republic, Honduras and Nicaragua, in order to continue to be well positioned to service demand in the peak summer selling season for T-shirts. Gildan says that the supply of products for the company’s retail customers is not affected by the situation in Haiti.

Gildan will provide a further analysis and update as soon as it has more complete information on the status of its Haitian sewing contractors and the country logistics and infrastructure.

“Most importantly, Gildan’s management wishes to express its concern for the well-being of the people of Haiti and is committed to playing a leadership role in efforts to provide humanitarian aid to the country,” Gildan said.

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