Textile sector will need 12 m more hands'

Coimbatore: Domestic textile sector is vested with advantages such as multi-fibre raw material base, large production bases in spinning and weaving, vast knowledge base in manpower and entrepreneurial skills.

But it is also facing problems in the form of fragmented structure due to infrastructure constraints, lack of labour reforms and high input costs, said Mr A.K. Singh, Union Textiles Secretary.

Speaking at the second convocation at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Institute of Textile Management (SVPITM), an autonomous institute, Mr Singh said the country's textile sector with its present direct workforce of 35 million will by 2011 require an additional 12 million workers which included five million skilled workers as it has set an export target of $50 billion out of the total production value of $85 billion.

The Government has formulated strategies for the industry to achieve the goals.

Textile exports, after the quota dismantle, had picked up by accounting for a 20 per cent growth in April-June 2006.

The establishment of institutes like SVPITM had assumed importance in meeting the manpower requirement.

With new challenges in the globalised textile environment, the domestic industry had to work with sound knowledge and managerial skills if it wanted to meet the set tasks in exports, he added.

Mr Singh said the Government was satisfied over the performance on the textile export front and exports during 2005-06 touched $17 billion with garments accounting for more than 50 per cent share at $8.4 billion.

The textile industry vision statement has set an overall production target of $115 billion by 2011-12 which included $55 billion of exports.

Earlier in his convocation presentation, Dr C. Anandan, Director, SVPITM, said the institute has restructured its apparel management course as a two-year post-graduate diploma in apparel management.