The Hindu Business Line : Textile Ministry for extending TUFS beyond 2007

THE UNION MINISTER of State for Textiles, Mr E.V.K.S. Elangovan, flanked by the Textile Commissioner, Mr J.N. Singh, and the Chairman of SSM College of Engineering, Komarapalayam, Mr M.S. Mathivanan, at a textiles conference in Coimbatore on Monday. — S. Siva Saravanan

Coimbatore , Aug.7

The Union Minister of State for Textiles, Mr E.V.K.S. Elangovan, on Monday assured the textile industry that his Ministry was seriously considering extending the technology upgradation fund scheme (TUFS) beyond 2007. But he hinted that the nitty-gritty of the extension, including the tenure, would be decided in consultation with the Finance Ministry.Speaking to presspersons after inaugurating a three-day international meet on non-woven and technical textiles here, Mr Elangovan said his Ministry was particular that TUFS be given an extended life. "Whether the government would extend the scheme as it is or should there be some changes would all be done in such a way that it would be beneficial to both the industry and the lending institutions," Mr Elangovan said addingthe final announcement would be made after consulting the Finance Ministry.

Mr Elangovan said his Ministry had set a textiles export target of $50 billion by 2010 and the domestic textile sector would have brought in an investment of Rs 1.40-lakh crore by then. To fulfil these tasks, the industry needed schemes like TUFS. Expressing satisfaction over the industry's performance on the export front, the Minister said textile exports from India this year would show a 24 per cent rise over last year's.

Technical textiles

Earlier, inaugurating the international conference on `Advances in fibrous materials, non-woven and technical textiles', Mr Elangovan pointed out that the demand and consumption of technical textiles would grow enormously in India in the near future and with a view to drawing a road-map for the development of this emerging area of value-added textiles, the Centre had formed an expert committee on technical textiles.

India has the capacity to take advantage of the development in the field of technical textiles and the country's share in the $107-billion world technical textiles market currently stood at 6 per cent and India's technical textiles trade during 2007-08 was expected to be $9 billion. He said the government would extend all support to boost the technical textile sector.

Mr J.N. Singh, Textile Commissioner, Ministry of Textiles, presiding over the inaugural session said, India's technical textiles sector would achieve volume growth from $6.7 billion (2005) to $12.4 billion by 2010 at a combined annual growth rate of 11.25 per cent as compared to the global technical textiles growth rate of 3.3 per cent (with production value increase from $107 billion to $127 billion). The growth driver for India's technical textiles would come from automotive, medical, agro, security and geo-textiles applications.

Action plan

The Central Government's action plan for promoting technical textiles had proposed adding 23 more machinery to the list of technical textile machinery eligible for 5 per cent import duty. It had also proposed to extend the TUFS benefits (under credit-linked subsidy scheme route currently made available to the processing sector) to technical textile projects also.

The new proposals include setting up of centres of excellence within the textile research associations/IITs for technical textiles and creating standards in technical textiles in accordance with the Bureau of Indian Standards.

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