Coimbatore: The Indian Texpreneurs Federation (ITF) has appealed to textile brands and retailers to focus on local sourcing to support domestic manufacturers, as this would create enormous job opportunities in the Indian sector.
Speaking on the increasing trend of import of textile products, convener of ITF, Prabhu Damodharan said, “Bangladesh's overall exports to India during July-April of the current fiscal, 2018-19, has increased by an astounding 53 per cent to touch US $1.07 billion. Data from the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) shows, Bangladesh earned $ 701.56 million during the same period of the last financial year.”
According to him, a major contributor to this has been from the readymade apparel sector. He said, "India has lost nearly Rs 7500 crore worth of garment business to its neighbour. It would have created an additional 6,000 jobs in the spinning sector, 500 jobs in the processing sector, one lakh jobs in the garment sector and another 40,000 jobs in the printing and embroidery sector of the textile value chain."
While the Indian textile industry is already facing sluggish demand in domestic markets, it is also witnessing stagnant exports, and the prospective job losses would be approximately 1.5 lakh. It will make a severe impact on the textile manufacturing sector," he rued.
Mr Damodharan said, "as per industry experts, Western retailers with outlets in India, as well as Indian local brands are sourcing their goods from Bangladesh. It is paradoxical because our Central government is making efforts to promote "Make in India", "Skill India" and incentivizing job creations in the textile industry, he pointed out.
He noted that considering the situation of the Indian textile industry and India's job creation challenge, the ITF urges all brands and retail chains operating in India to explore possibilities of partnerships with garmenting hubs of the country like Coimbatore, Tirupur, Karur, Erode ,Surat and Ludhiana.
"Indian clusters can better serve the sourcing needs of both Western and Indian brands with quality and competitive pricing , than products sourced from either Bangladesh, Sri Lanka or Indonesia," he added.
