Coimbatore town in southern India has the potential to become the next hub of technical textiles, according to Ms. Shashi Singh, Executive Director of the Indian Technical Textile Association (ITTA).

 

Inaugurating the Indo-Czech International Conference (ICIC 2014) on “Advancements in Specialty Textiles and their Applications in Material Engineering and Medical Sciences” in Coimbatore, Ms. Singh said that Coimbatore can become the next hub of technical textiles, although there would be a slightly long gestation period.

 

Ms. Singh said the annual per capita use of technical textiles in India was only 1.7 kg, much lower compared to 16.5 kg in the US and 12 kg in the EU. Hence, there is a vast potential for increasing the use of technical textiles in India.

 

She said the ITTA was closely working with the Indian Government to make few technical textile applications mandatory, in order to improve the demand. For example, they are working on increased use of geo textiles, agri textiles and installation of air bag in cars.

 

The two-day conference was organized by the Departments of Textile and Fashion Technology, Coimbatore, jointly with the Faculty of Textile Engineering, Technical University of Liberec, Czech Republic.

 

Of late, technical textiles and textile material engineering has emerged as an important segment of the textile industry. Therefore, the Government of India has launched a programme for promotion of technical textiles namely “Technology Mission on Technical Textiles”. Under this programme, eight Centres of Excellence have been set up across the country.

 

ICIC 2014 deliberated on smart textiles, medical textiles, composites, nonwovens, material engineering, filtration textiles, geo textiles, ecological and environmental textiles, technical textile machinery, modeling and simulation in textile, and process engineering.

 

Ms. Singh, a former Joint Textile Commissioner, Office of the Textile Commissioner, Ministry of Textiles, was associated with the schemes related to technical textile industry like the Scheme for Growth and Development of Technical Textiles (SGDTT) and Technology Mission on Technical Textiles (TMTT).