Textile industry told to digitise supply chain
Indian companies should focus more on the 1.3 billion-people domestic market, achieve scale, and gradually look at exploring export opportunities as India become globally competitive in due course, Ajay Arora, Managing Director, D’decor Home Fabrics Pvt Ltd, said at an industry forum held by FICCI.
Addressing ‘FICCI TAG 2021, 12th annual Textile and Apparel Conference’ on the theme ‘Repositioning Indian Textiles and Strategizing for Growth in the Post-COVID World’ Arora and his fellow speakers also called for product development, digitalization, focus niche products and world class Research and Development institutions as a way forward to reposition India.
“Digitalization across value chain is the key to growth and competitiveness in textile industry in India. It increases the interaction with buyers and allow companies to work closer to consumer through e-commerce,” he stressed.
G V Aras from ATE Enterprise suggested that the country needs to broaden its product basket to increase global footprint and look beyond the US and EU for growth.
Home textiles, technical textiles, cotton and synthetic knit goods will be the front runners to provide desired growth and newer opportunities, he said.
“India can look at collaboration with neighbouring countries across supply chain to give push to textile industry’s growth,” added D Ghosh, Vice President- Sales, Oerlikon Textile India Pvt Ltd.
“Synthetics industry growth is the key and India need to increase the share of man-made fibers in the country to increase share of Indian textile industry in global market,” said Ghosh at the forum on 15 Jan 2021.
If Indian companies need to achieve the scale, then end to end approach is required and it needs to be supported by world-class R&D institution set up in public private partnership, added R D Udeshi, President, Polyester Chain, Reliance Industries.
“Indian textiles industry has revived post-COVID with the help of new product segments in knit-based industry as focus on comfort wear has grown among users substantially,” he observed.
India needs to reposition itself through anchor led model, which will involve MSME’s to develop scale, according to Prashant Agarwal, Joint Managing Director of Wazir Advisors Pvt Ltd.
He underlined the need for complete digitization of supply chain which will make Indian companies more competitive and give services as per buyers need.
Creating sustainability across supply chain and adopting collaborative approach is the way forward for the textile industry’s growth, added Ajay Sardana, Joint President & Head – Corporate Affairs, Grasim Pulp & Fibre Business.
Gunish Jain, CEO, Bluekaktus shared the importance of digitalization in the textile and apparel industry and the way companies are adopting advance technologies to address future opportunity areas.
“Cotton is our strength; we should not lose focus on same. While proactive product development is the key to growth, sustainability along with compliance can create huge differentiation for India among global peers,” said S K Gupta, Advisor and Board Director, Raymond Ltd. #digital #technology #exports #manufacturing #investment /fiinews.com
