UPA govt encouraging PPP in R

Coimbatore, Apr 7 (UNI) The United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre is encouraging public-private partnership (PPP) in Research and Development (R&D) projects to help the textile industry to collaborate with Textile Research Associations (TRAs) in areas of their day-to-day technological needs.

Inaugurating the 48th Technical conference here, he said the Central government had allocated substantial funds for R&D in new areas of application over and above the funds provided for general development of the textile sector.

The government's aim was to support innovation, investment in R&D, shore up generic research programmes of TRAs and encourage the textile industry to support the TRAs to cater to their technological needs, he added.

Participation of the textile industry would continue to be sought in the selection and monitoring of all research projects sponsored by the government, Mr Elangovan said and added that the thrust areas identified for R&D were decentralized sector, which included handlooms, product development, cost reduction in the entire manufacturing chain, development of eco-friendly technologies, among other things.

Asking the entrepreneurs to set apart a percentage of their profits for R&D, the minister said partnership between industry and TRAs was necessary to overcome future challenges.

Stating that the Indian textile sector had the potential to reach 85 billion US Dollars by 2010 from the current 36 billion USD with an average growth rate of 11 per cent, Mr Elangovan said the export of textiles during 2006-07 was 19.7 billion USD.

The Union Government had created an enabling environment for the growth of textile industry as the bulk of the industry was still riddled with out-dated technology and old machineries.

As upgradation of technology was an area of major concern for the Indian textile industry, the Union Government had enhanced the bugetary allocation for Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme (TUFS) to Rs 911 crore this year from Rs 535 crore last year.

Southern India Mills Association (SIMA) chairman S V Arumugham, addressing the conference, urged the Union Government to extend the TUFS till 2012 so that the textile sector could invest close to Rs two lakh crore for technology ugradation.

The conference was organised by South India Textile Research Association (SITRA), Ahmedabad Textile Industries Researh Association (ATIRA), North India Textile Research Association (NITRA) and Bombay Textile Research Association (BTRA).

UNI