The textile industry from south India has urged the textile minister to direct Cotton Corporation of India (CCI) to offload cotton in the market as the textile mills in the region are running short of quality cotton.
Due to fall in cotton prices, CCI, in order to safeguard the interest of the farmers has procured 86 lakh bales of cotton under minimum support price (MSP) operations, mainly from Andhra Pradesh and Telengana but it has only offloaded 3 lakh bales of cotton and is holding the balance of 83 lakh bales, the south Indian textile industry claimed.
T. Rajkumar, chairman, Southern India Mills’ Association (SIMA) said that though CCI has temporarily suspended sale of cotton and as a result a large number of textile mills are running short of quality cotton as the same is not available in the open market. “We have appealed to the textile minister to direct CCI to immediately commence selling of cotton by e-auction directly to the actual users with liberal credit norms considering the current financial crisis being faced by the spinning mills.
The spinning mills are facing problem due to continuing glut in the yarn markets and delay in getting TUF subsidies and other government dues.
The SIMA chairman also appealed the minister to advice CCI to avoid quoting higher prices than the market prices. Tamil Nadu accounts for one-third of the textile business in the country. The textile mills in the state account for 44% of total spinning capacity of the country and 60% of its yarn exports. Altogether, the textile mills in the state earn a foreign exchange of over Rs 75,000 crore. The state’s textile industry provides direct employment for over 50 lakh people
