In The News

ADD on yarns hurting powerlooms

“Anti-dumping duty has been imposed on most of the raw materials used by the synthetic and art silk weaving industry, such as POY, VFY, NFY and PFY.

These duties are making it difficult for weavers to get competitively priced raw materials. Coupled with this is the rising imports of low priced, and underinvoiced fabrics. The government is entering into free trade agreements with several countries and import tariffs are being reduced.

There is an attempt to remove specific import duty. All this is putting a lot of pressure on the decentralised powerloom sector, with 40 per cent of the looms in various centres lying idle,” said Mr V S Chalke, chairman, Sythetic and Art Silk Mills Association (SASMA). He was speaking at the 66th AGM of the association.

He further stated that exports of synthetic fabrics during the first 2-3 months of this financial year show a negative trend. “A large portion of our domestic market is already captured by imports from China and other countries. If the decentralised sector is to survive, it needs to get raw material at international prices,” he stressed.

He further appealed to the government to do away with the Textiles Committee cess, and to do away with the confusion on VAT for processing. He welcomed the integrated textile park project of the government, and stated that these could be successful if uninterrupted, quality electricity is made available.