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The Coir Board had set an ambitious export target worth Rs 2,000 crore by the end of the Twelfth Plan period as against the last year's earnings worth Rs 806 crore, according to Mr V.S.Vijayaraghavan, the Board Chairman.
Expressing hope that the export sector would be able to achieve the target, he pointed out that coir was the only export item from India that had maintained a continuous growth trajectory even during the recent global economic crisis.
Coir mission
Inaugurating a three-day Management Development Programme for coir exporters and executives in the coir sector at Alappuzha, he said the Board had already submitted a memorandum to the Prime Minister urging the setting up of a Coir Mission with this in view and sought the co-operation of the export community to boost exports.
At the initiative of the Coir Board, the Union Government had also extended increased benefits to the export sector under its Foreign Trade Policy to sustain exports of handloom products, which was showing a downward trend in the recent past, he said.
The training programme, intended to develop trade skills and professional competency among the participants and equip them to keep pace with the emerging global challenges, is being imparted by faculty members of the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi.
The programme is part of the Coir Board's objective of developing an integrated approach among the coir manufacturers and exporters towards enriching Export Management Skills to deal with the growing demand and changing tastes of the customers both in the domestic and overseas markets. A similar training programme is being arranged at Pollachi in Tamil Nadu from June 27, he said.
The Coir Board Director (Marketing), Mr M. Kumaraswamy Pillai, said the Board was encouraging export of value-added coir products instead of raw materials such as fibre and coir pith, which together accounted for roughly 30 per cent of the total export earnings at present.
Export community
The Coir Board Secretary, Mr M. Kumara Raja, expressed the hope that the export community would be greatly benefited by the three-day training programme in their export business.
A total of 30 members drawn from the coir exporting community in the region are participating in the programme.
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