 Quality
certifications and standards when implemented correctly and practised at
every stage of the production process, leads to a lot of benefits in terms
of monetary savings as also savings in time, wastages, etc. Raymond has
these certifications in place for many years now, and the company has established
systems to follow the right practices. Almost every big textile company
has been using these tools to improve productivity, processes, cut short
lead times, reduce wastages, etc. The industry, by and large, needs to follow
such quality systems, productivity systems, benchmarks, etc, specially now
that we are operating in a free trade regime. There should be a proactive
approach to these practices, rather than being buyer driven. At the same
time, these systems can be adopted and can run successfully in companies
that have excellent leadership. If we have leaders in the industry, quality
certifications and audits become easier to implement. Fortunately, the industry
is realising the importance of having systems in place, which gives them
a huge competitive edge. ISO certifications, social audits, etc are becoming
a minimum qualification for approaching international buyers. That is not
to say that buyers are demanding that factories have these certifications,
but it definitely is a selling point, and tells about the company's work
processes and its seriousness. Buyers could look favourably at such units.
And there is a growing trend of smaller companies also moving in this direction.
|
 The
industry, specially the SMEs, can benefit immensely from quality and environmental
certifications, social audits, and other productivity and quality tools.
These are not necessarily buyer driven, and cannot be considered to be
a trade obstacle. The SMEs are slow in realising the need to implement
best practices, and standards like Kaiban, Kaizen, 6 Sigma, etc. These
are very stringent tools, and aim at innovation at every stage of the
production process, thus involving every worker in a factory. This is
what is needed in the textile industry. It not only improves operations
and quality, but also results in better employer-worker relationship,
an important area that the industry needs to work in. However, the industry
is largely unaware of these tools. This holds true for both big and small
textile units.
The Textiles Committee is helping the industry to get
such certifications, and we too are thinking of something on similar lines,
but it may take some time for our programme to begin. There is an urgent
need to sensitise the industry about the need for such tools. I would
like to have in place a system followed in Japan, of quality awards. These
are difficult to achieve, and some of the very successful companies in
Japan are also unable to get the awards, despite having a number of systems
in place. This, I believe is what is needed in India too.
|
