The minister added that other than growing in statistical terms, the focus should also be on scaling up technology and production of indigenously innovated products.
Union Minister for textiles, Piyush Goyal said time has come that India target five times increase in the export of technical textiles in the next three years. He was speaking to representatives of the Indian Technical Textile Association (ITTA) on Friday.
"It may be noted that the growth of Technical Textiles in India has gained momentum in past 5 years, currently growing at 8 per cent per annum. Our aim is to hasten this growth to 15-20 per cent range during next 5 years," the minister stated. He mentioned that the central government had launched the National Technical Textiles Mission in 2020, aspiring to make India self-reliant, vibrant and an export-oriented economy.
He added that the central government would support production-linked incentive schemes for the textile sector in states supporting the development and offering affordable infrastructure for textile manufacturing like cheap land and power. Additionally, there should be public-private participation in using government funds for carrying out research and development in technical textiles.
The textiles minister informed that the current world market (for textiles) is $250 billion and India's share stood at $19 billion. The biggest players in the realm are Western Europe, China, the United States and Japan. The minister added that other than growing in statistical terms, the focus should also be on scaling up technology and production of indigenously innovated products.
He added that there should be no difference in the quality of textiles meant for international and domestic consumers.
A post-event ministry statement said the technical textiles are the technology of the future. It informed that technical textiles are engineered textiles meant for use-specific applications. India enjoys major global visibility in packaging textiles, geotechnical textiles and agricultural textiles. "The Applications of Technical Textiles are widening day by day with the advent of new materials. Along with new inventions made in smart textiles; 3-D Weaving, smart wear for health monitoring and ultra-high performing sportswear are bringing in new avenues which were unthinkable a few years back," the statement read.