How a Bangladeshi garment-maker is fighting the Middle East energy crunch

A recent survey of 134 knitwear factories found that 55% had seen buyers cancel or cut orders because of gas and power shortages since late August, and 78% had partially halted production. The factories also reported shipment delays and discounted orders to buyers.

But that's not yet the case at 4A, whose factory on Dhaka's outskirts employs nearly 7,500 workers and meets around 40% of its electricity needs through solar, the rest mainly through its own gas and diesel generation.

"We never stayed at a single-source energy dependency. We had backups for everything," said company co-owner Abdullah Hil Nakib. "We need some sort of certainty. But the cost of doing business has increased. First there was a shortage of oil, then a shortage of gas."

Costlier diesel has pushed 4A's production costs up by 2% to 3%, adding up to 5 million taka ($40,950) to its monthly fuel bill, he said.