The technical textiles of India is expected to grow at 12 per cent CAGR and reach 1,16,217 crore by 2017-18. The market for technical textile stood at Rs 92,499 crore in 2015-16. India is expected to play a key role in shaping the future technical textile market with consumers spending more on medical products, sportswear and home textile products.

“Government is also taking promotional steps to encourage the use of technical textiles in the country. It is also promoting investments in technical textiles through various measures such as allowing 100 per cent FDI in technical textiles, launching various schemes such as Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme, Scheme for Integrated Textile Park, Technology Mission on Technical Textiles and promotion of agro textiles and geotextiles in the northeastern region among others,” the assistant director of Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Amit Kakkar, told Fibre2Fashion.

As a result of these growth enablers, segments like geotech, mobiltech, meditech, indutech, buildtech, packtech have shown double digit growth of 30%, 17%, 15%, 15%, 14%, 14% respectively over last five years and are expected to follow the same trend in the coming years, he said.

When asked about the technological upgradation in the technical textiles sector that will promote the ‘Make in India’ concept, Kakkar said that the ‘Make in India’ initiative has led to a good response from the investors. “India is becoming an attractive destination for manufacturing. In the automobile sector, major investments were announced recently from big players such as Honda, Force Motors, Boeing, Isuzu motors, Airbus, Suzuki etc. A similar trend in investments has been observed in other industries such as infrastructure, healthcare and engineering among others. Since a large number of technical textile products are consumed in these industries, an increase in the investments in these areas will lead to higher consumption of technical textiles.”

The proactive approach of the government towards boosting the sector through various schemes will bring out positive results in the future. Indian technical textile industry is still in the growing phase.

Kakkar believes that Indian textile industry should focus more on manufacturing high end innovative products whose demand is very high internationally. “The global market for technical textiles is rapidly increasing which provides an opportunity for Indian industry to increase its exports,” he said.

“An increasing focus on research and development in this sector by Textile Research Associations will help the industry in competing with the global market where the demand of innovative products is increasing. Although the focus on R&D has increased over the last few years but the required focus is still not present,” he added. (RR)