Virendra Singh Rawat / Lucknow
Uttar Pradesh, which ranks among the top textile producers in India, is eyeing Rs 10,000 crore of investment in the textile sector.
Armed with a new textile policy, which was approved last week, the state is targetting to generate half-million jobs in the next five years.
With a share of almost 13 percent, UP is among the top three domestic textile manufacturing states.
The UP textile and garmenting policy 2022 seeks to establish the state as a major global textile hub by strengthening the entire value chain viz. handloom, powerloom, spinning, weaving, processing etc.
In fact, UP is looking to give tough competition to the leading textile exporters in the Asia, notably Vietnam, Bangladesh and Indonesia.
Under the new policy, the state will set up five textile and garment parks to increase the income of state handloom and powerloom weavers by 50 percent.
Besides, the government will modernise powerloom and use solar energy to run them. The state silk production will be boosted to meet the entire local demand.
According to an estimate, there are 258,000 handloom and 550,000 powerloom weavers in UP. There are 58 spinning mills and 74 textile mills also.
Moreover, the share of UP in carpet production is almost 90 percent, while the textile and garment sector contributes the second largest employment opportunities after agriculture.
Last year, the Yogi Adityanath government had urged the Centre to take steps for the removal of trade barriers for Indian apparel exports in the European markets.
While Indian textile exports attracted higher tariffs, the shipments from Asian peers such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia faced much lower and sometimes zero tariffs.
Thus, higher prices were rendering the Indian textile exports uncompetitive, thereby hurting the domestic industry.
Union minister of state for textile Darshana Jardosh had, in his address to Parliament on July 30, 2021, had said high tariffs in key markets such as the EU and the UK were affecting India’s exports.