Tirupur keen to start with synthetic based products to augment revenue

Tirupur prominent for making quality cotton based knitwear garment as they are unable to generate more revenue with cotton exports, they need to diversify. Synthetic has global market throughout the year and at present, synthetic fabrics for swim wear or sportswear are not manufactured in India. As they have the expertise for this and they need to start the process, stated A Sakthivel, president of Tirupur Exporters Association.

He also pointed out that there is good scope for increasing the market share in the global market from the current level of about 2.6 per cent by exporting value-added products and synthetic products.

Many units in Tirupur, known as the dollar city of India, are idle for months and owners of these units strongly feel that by entering into synthetic-based products they will not only be able to generate more employment and but it will help them increase revenue. Unlike knitwear or cotton-based textiles, the demand for synthetic garments is not seasonal.

Tirupur is keen on entering the synthetic fabric market, after setting up a strong base in exporting cotton-based knitwear garments. Tirupur’s textile mills exported over Rs 17,800 crore worth of products in 2013-14, of which 65 percent was exported to Europe.

Tirupur, the knits capital of India have been supplying cotton apparels to many global brands like Walmart, Hennes & Mauritz, Tommy Hilfiger, Polo, Decathlon, Marks and Spencer, to name a few, over the years.

According to textile industry experts by entering into synthetic garment segment they would gradually grow until it would be a 50:50 game. Roughly half the exports from here would be in the synthetic garment sector. To produce synthetic garments, a Knitwear Technology Mission has been set up in Tirupur and the Tirupur Exporters Association has invested around Rs 18 crore for procuring relevant machinery.

They have appealed to the central government to reduce customs duty on import of synthetic, blended and specialty fabric of cotton in the forthcoming Union Budget. Tirupur contributes about 45 percent to total knitwear exports from India. There are 1,500 knitting units and 4,750 units that are into various activities like dyeing and bleaching, fabric printing, garment making, embroidery, compacting and calendaring and other ancillary units.

Instability in cotton prices is pushing synthetic demand. Moreover, weak monsoon forecasts for current year could make cotton scarce and costlier and increase substitution demand for synthetic textiles. Globally also the ratio of synthetic versus cotton textiles consumption is more than that in India.

Tirupur has contributed to India’s cotton yarn production, which grew 10.5 per cent year-on-year during April-November 2013. But there is a a steady growing seen in synthetic yarn production and blended yarn production at 8.9 per cent and 7.9 per cent year-on-year, respectively.

Some of the bigger players in Tirupur have already started with testing waters with synthetic garments and working out options to make synthetic-based products beginning with just a few clients.