As part of the handloom package, the Government has announced a six-fold strategy to offer financial support to handloom weavers. Under the scheme, weavers will be eligible to margin money assistance of Rs. 4,200-5,400 per head and interest subsidy of three per cent on loans for a period of three years. Credit cards will be issued to eligible individual weavers to enable them to access loans upto Rs. 2 lakhs in a period of three years without any collateral security.
The Government has convened stakeholders’ meetings at ministerial level to assess the slowdown in the industry. The Cotton Advisory Board (CAB) and the Cotton Yarn Advisory Board (CYAB) meetings held on November 15 assessed domestic mill consumption of cotton for 2011-12 at 210 lakh bales, down from 240 lakh bales, and cotton yarn production down from 3,900 million kg to 3,200 million kg, indicating the slowdown in the textiles industry.
The Government is also considering the industry representation for a moratorium on loans for capital intensive requests and special relaxation in RBI’s prudential norms to avoid asset reclassification or additional provisioning to address the industry slowdown.
Exports
The textile industry is one of the most labour intensive sectors spreading over the hand-spun and hank-woven sector at one end of the spectrum and the capital intensive sophisticated mill sector at the other. The textile sector provides direct employment to over 35 million people. Exports being made by the sector have a key role in the economy.
During 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11 the foreign capital earnings by this sector were valued at $21.23 billion, $22.42 billion and $26.83 billion respectively. The share of exports of textile & clothing items (including coir & coir manufacturers and jute) in the total export value of the economy was 11.46 per cent, 12.54 per cent and 10.63 per cent for 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11.
As per the latest provisional figure released by DGCI&S, the share of export of textile & clothing items in the total export value was 9.28 per cent for April-July 2011.