According to Ravi Capoor, Secretary of the Union Ministry of Textiles, “the Central Government is expected to roll out a Textile Policy by the middle of this year. We are working on a policy. Two rounds of consultations have been held with the stakeholders. Hopefully by mid-year we should have the new policy.”
In order to attract investors, the country is in need for cost effectiveness which is a major challenge. The factor affecting cost effectiveness is lack of scale. “New industries should look at scale. The Ministry plans to develop 10 mega textile parks. Each one will be an integrated park. We hope to bring some economies of scale with this. India should be a destination for Foreign Direct Investment in textiles. We need good infrastructure for it.” The Ministry was talking to the States. Any State which has minimum 1,000 acres ready for the park will be supported to develop it, he commented further.
The Secretary was hopeful of textile and garment exports increasing this financial year compared to last year, when it was roughly $38 billion. Indian exporters are largely cotton based.
Another important area is of technical textiles. The Cabinet is expected to approve the National Technical Textiles Mission, announced in the Budget, soon. “We are going to spend ₹1,000 crore in developing raw materials for technical textiles; research associations will be asked to produce applications for these.”
