Karur home textile hit by high yarn prices

Home textile manufacturers and exporters struggling to meet orders with the abnormal rise in prices of yarn, shot up by 35 percent in the last three months which is attributed to a direct fallout of the Central government tinkering with its cotton and yarn export policy.

Karur home textile industry that fetches foreign exchange to the tune of Rs. 4,000 crore a year. Hundreds of home textile manufacturers and exporters have been affected by the steep rise in prices of yarn which have upset their calculations and future plans.

Home textiles products are made from lower count yarn for which the consumption of cotton is high compared to higher count yarn. With spinning mills running short of cotton, they are inclined to produce higher count yarn which leads to huge shortfall of lower count yarn for the Karur manufacturers. Even if

it is made available, the price of lower count yarn is very prohibitive, according to Karur Exporters’ Association president ‘Atlas’ M. Nachimuthu.

Most of the Karur home textile exporters enter into annual price contracts with their clients abroad and the sudden and steep increase in prices of yarn directly impacts them. They are also struggling to meet the delivery time schedule due to shortage of required count yarn and bleeding financially to honour commitments, Mr. Nachimuthu added.

The price quotes of Karur home textile exporters are at a higher side compared to those from China, Pakistan and Bangladesh among other countries who are the major competitors. There was the dire reality of customers migrating to exporters from competing countries resulting in India losing its global market share in home textile exporters.

The Central government must seriously revisit the cotton and yarn export policy that was hurting the Karur home textile exporters on a massive scale. The huge volumes of cotton exports done must be stopped ignoring the demand of domestic consumers such as spinning mills who cater to the requirements of specific categories such as home textile exporters. The needs of domestic spinning mills should be looked into as top priorities.