Textiles minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar said that new Textiles Policy is close to finalization and to be issued before the end of April during the forthcoming budget session of the Lok Sabha. The policy is expected to accommodate a series of reforms to make India a truly manufacturing hub in textiles sectors so that Indian textiles players can take maximum advantages of the slowdown in Chinese textiles industry.
To begin with, the industry will see amendment in the labour law to facilitate women workforce to work during night shift. As per existing norms, women are allowed to work only in the day shift. With the textiles sector being the second-largest employment provider with over 50 per cent coming in from women segment in rural India, it is important to facilitate women workforce adequate policy support to work during the night shift.
The government has also laid specific focus on reducing transportation cost, as a result of which the cotton seed transport cost has come down by almost 25 to 40 per cent.
Gangwar said his ministry has given approval for 24 new Textile parks which will create employment for an additional 4,50,000 people.
The textile ministry has written to the ministry of finance to lower interest rates to seven per cent on working capital.
The textile industry currently employs 35 million workforce which is targeted to double by 2022. For which the government has focused on skilling of youth in various sectors. Through this, however, around 625,000 of skilled manpower have been given employment in textiles sector in the last 18 months.
The minister said the slowdown in Chinese economy has rendered cost of textile production in China high. So, Chinese textiles manufacturers have lost competitive advantages of lower cost of production in the last few months. This has offered an opportunity for Indian players to grab the market share of China in the developed world especially the European Union and United States which cumulatively consists of around 60 per cent of the global export market share. This is the right time to increase country’s market share in exports, he added.
