Several weavers in Coimbatore and Tirupur districts, which have nearly two lakh powerloom units taking up job work for larger fabric manufacturers, are looking at opportunities to market their products directly. P. Kumarasamy, secretary of the Coimbatore District Job Working Powerloom Unit Owners' Association, told The Hindu on Monday that almost all the job working looms in the two districts make grey fabric, which is processed later. These are mostly for demand from the Northern States.
Orders from the State Government for school uniform, saris and dhotis are mainly distributed to the cooperative societies.
Recently the Government sought bids for manufacture of large number of saris for free distribution.
However, individual small-scale powerloom units will not be able to take up such orders.
Hence, the association has appealed to the State Government to permit the small-scale powerloom units that are not with the cooperative societies to take up bulk orders jointly.
Nearly 50 per cent of the job working powerloom units are ready to take up orders directly. They need market guidance and support. These weavers are apprehensive of taking up private orders immediately.
Hence, they should be supported with orders from the Government. “We need a development corporation,” says Mr. Kumarasamy.
Norms
The Government should fix the price and specify the quality standards for fabric. Units that are capable of meeting these two norms should be permitted to cater to Government orders, he said. These job work powerloom units are willing to diversify to new varieties such as fabric made of dyed yarn and also have the capacity to manufacture at competitive prices.
Since most of the job work units are small-scale they do not have financial capacity to take up large scale orders individually. They should be helped to take up bulk orders in groups, he said.
Keywords: powerloom units, textile industry
