Japanese hand-holding of India textile-apparel industry
The Japanese State Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Yasumasa Nagasaka sees a substantial development in the India-Japan trade relationship, taking it forward from the 2011-signed Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) with an immediate focus on textiles and apparels (T&A).
He pointed out that CEPA imposes zero duty on the Japanese imports of Indian garment and highlighted the scope of increasing T&A imports from India which is the sixth largest T&A exporter. “There is a huge untapped potential for T&A trade which remains unharnessed,” added Nagasaka.
It is in this backdrop that a high level delegation from the Textile Ministry was mounted in February 2019 with a view to enhance exports and cooperation in textile sector and to identify areas for optimizing the benefit of CEPA. As an outcome of these developments, India’s Textiles Committee entered into negotiation with Nissenken Quality Evaluation Centre of Japan for providing valuable services to the textile trade and industries of both the countries through collaborative efforts between the two organisations.
Following the negotiation, Nissenken has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian Textile Ministry, which would boost the Technical Textiles sector as well and improve sourcing from India. The MoU was signed by Textile Minister Smriti Zubin Irani and Nagasaka on 27 Jan 2021.
The MoU is to provide required support to textile’s trade and industry for ensuring quality as per the requirement of Japanese buyers through Testing, Inspection & Conformity Assessment, Training & Capacity Building, Research & Development (R&D) and Consultancy.
The MoU will strengthen the bilateral trade by enhancing India’s T&A export to Japan which is the third largest export destination of the world.
Both the institutions have agreed under the MoU to share and exchange relevant technical information and documentation on a regular basis and carry out activities relating to standards, quality assurance norms, joint research projects on testing, development of user friendly tools for dissemination of data to the industry and facilitate sourcing across the Textiles Value Chain (TVC) from both the countries.
Minister Smriti Irani noted the challenge relating to stringent quality standards for exports to Japan. She expressed confidence that the MoU will help in creating awareness on the various quality parameters being sought by the Japanese and extending hand-holding support to the Indian exporters to adopt and upgrade their technology so as to enhance the quality of products and satisfy the stipulations as required by the Japanese market.
Nissenken Quality Evaluation Centre is one of the leading Testing and Inspection organizations in Japan established in 1948 and providing world-class facilities and rendering valuable services to the textiles trade and industry in Japan and seven other countries including China, Indonesia, Myanmar, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Cambodia and India.
The Textiles Committee was established in the year 1963 by an Act of Parliament and is a statutory body under the Ministry of Textiles with a mandate, inter alia, to ensure quality of all textiles and textile products for domestic and export markets.
The Textiles Committee is the only body providing for all the quality related needs of the entire Textiles Value Chain (TVC) in an integrated format on a pan-India basis through its network of 28 offices across the country including 19 state of art laboratories accredited under relevant national and International standards. #manufacturing #exports #textile #investment #technology /fiinews.com
