The Government has announced a National Technical Textiles Mission at an estimated outlay of ₹1,480 crore that can help the industry take advantage of the growing demand in the domestic market and reverse the trend of increasing imports.

“The announcement of the Technical Textiles Mission is fantastic. It will lead to capacity building and import substitution. There is tremendous scope here,” said Sanjay Jain, former head of the Confederation of Indian Textile Industry.

India imports significant quantity of technical textiles worth $16 billion every year. “To reverse this trend (of imports) and to position India as a global leader in technical textiles, a National Technical Textiles Mission is proposed with a four-year implementation period from 2020-21 to 2023-24 at an estimated outlay of ₹1,480 crore,” said Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Budget 2020-21.

Anti-dumping duty

The Government has also decided to abolish anti-dumping duty on PTA, a chemical which is a critical input for textile fibres and yarns. “Its easy availability at competitive prices is desirable to unlock the immense potential in the textile sector which is a significant employment generator. Therefore, in the larger public interest, anti-dumping duty on PTA is being abolished,” she said. Technical textiles are used in a wide range of applications such as in agriculture, medicine, industry, sports, protection and environment conservation. Use of technical textiles has benefits of increased productivity in agriculture, horticulture and aquaculture fields, better protection of military, para-military, police and security forces, stronger and sturdier transportation infrastructure for highways, railways, ports and airports and in improving hygiene and healthcare of general public.

The market size in India for technical textiles in the year 2017-18 was projected at ₹1,16,217 crore. “Although, there is no projection in the last baseline study with regard to the projections for the 2020-21, taking into account the current trend of growth and various initiatives of the Government, domestic market size of the technical textiles is expected to cross ₹2 lakh crore by the year 2020-21,” a Textile Ministry release said.

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