Mumbai, Aug 29 (UNI) Mr Ravi Capoor, Secretary, Ministry of Textiles today said that government is in the process of finalisng 40 new Harmonised System of Nomenclature (HSN) codes for technical textiles sector in coming months.

Speaking at the 'TECHNOTEX 2019', Mr Capoor said that the government has already established HSN codes for 207 items, yet a large number of items are still not under any specific category of codes. 'Another list of 40 such HS codes have been under consideration and in next few months, we will have dedicated codes for 40 such items,' he said.

Mr Capoor stressed on the mandatory use of technical textiles in over 90 areas, which the government is currently discussing. He further highlighted that 'technical textiles' is the sunrise industry of the country and we have to create an ecosystem for time-bound research in the institutions for technical textiles segment.

Highlighting the potential of this sector in India, Mr Capoor said that globally the technical textiles market is around USD 200-250 billion with a very high CAGR and India is still not in the forefront in terms of annual growth rate of the sector. He emphasised on the need to have private sector participation in government’s research system with a time-bound output strategy.

Dr V K Saraswat, Member, NITI Aayog highlighted the factors contributing to the growth of this sector which includes rising consumer awareness, usage and improvement in the overall process innovation.

Dr Saraswat also highlighted the need for establishing a coordinated approach between various stakeholders and the government to boost the sector. 'We need to have an umbrella organisation for better coordination between the industry, R&D centers and government,' he said.

Mr Shishir Jaipuria, Chairman, FICCI Textile Committee and CMD, Ginni Filaments Ltd said that Industry-led R&D efforts will boost the technical textiles sector. He further said local value-addition needs to be promoted so that the import dependency is reduced.

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