The government is actively considering to provide a regulatory framework to achieve 25% growth per annum of technical textiles against business-as-usual growth of 11%, said Smt. Rita Menon, Secretary, Ministry of Textile while addressing the workshop on ‘Strengthening-Government-Industry-Consumer Partnership in Protective Textiles’ organized jointly by Ministry of Textile and FICCI.

Secretary Textiles said that the protective textiles are a growing industry, which is expected to increase from Rs.1,259 crore in 2007-08 to over Rs. 2,000 crore by 2012-13.

Presently, 60%-65% of the domestic consumption of protective textile is met through imports. There is an urgent need to develop standards, procedures and manufacturing capacities of international standards, if India is to compete globally and corner a large share of this emerging segment of textiles. Government is planning road shows in seven European countries to attract foreign investment, informed Secretary (Textiles).

Rita Menon said that the government has set up four centers of Excellence (CoEs) for Meditech, Agrotech, Geotech and Protech group of technical textiles, which will provide one-stop facilities for testing, human resource development and research and development. These Centres of Excellence (CoEs) will be equipped with state-of-the-art laboratories which will be accredited to NABL to meet international standards. The activities of the CoEs will be synergized with the laboratories of Defence Research and Development Organizations (DRDO) and Director General Quality Assurance (DGQA) to set standards for defence procurement and fulfill the Defence and Para Military forces requirement.

Already government has removed fiscal anamolies affecting the development of technical textile and we are providing 10% capital subsidy under technology up gradation fund schemes for machinery used for manufacture of technical textiles.