Gujarat-Africa cotton value-chain cooperation looks promising

30 Nov '10

7 min read

A meeting between delegates of the eight East-African countries and various stake holders across the cotton textile value chain in Gujarat was held at Ahmedabad on Friday, the last day of the grueling two-week tour of India, in which they visited cotton growing regions, research centres, ginneries and textile mills in Maharashtra and Gujarat.

The theme of the Switzerland based, International Trade Centre (ITC) led African delegation was “India - Africa Co-operation along the Cotton Value Chain”, which hopes develop cooperation between India and these African countries across the cotton textile value-chain.

In the first two days in Gujarat, these delegates had the opportunity to witness firsthand a handloom centre, various cotton ginneries, a delinting plant, manufacturing unit of Arvind Ltd and a meeting with the Gujarat Agriculture & Cooperative Minister, Mr Dilipbhai Sanghani and other state government officials.

Dr PR Roy, Director of fibre2fashion gave the welcome address and spoke about the genuine need to develop cooperation between India and the African countries, beginning from seeds to machinery and in the process promote the whole cotton textile value chain and also strongly advocated technology development and usage of new cotton technology.

Mr Viren Mehta, Head (Marketing) – fibre2fashion then gave a presentation on the services provided by fibre2fashion. He began by informing about the visitor base of fibre2fashion, which includes decision makers and stake holders from across all the continents on the globe.

A few of the offline initiatives of fibre2fashion, Mr Mehta said, were, organizing international level conferences, providing valued inputs for the much awaited National Fiber Policy of the Government of India; association of Dr PR Roy as expert member - Sub group - Yarns and Fabrics in the formulation of the Five year plan by the Government of India; the strategic alliance with Textiles Intelligences, UK; working closely with handloom clusters in India and Textile Bulletin – a print publication from fibre2fashion.

With regards to the core on-line business, Mr Mehta enlightened the audience about various initiatives like premium membership which helps members with business leads, sourcing and selling; market watch report, a comprehensive pricing report on textile raw materials; online promotion & advertising; website development and finally corporate membership, which is a comprehensive proposition, encompassing all the services of fibre2fashion.

In particular, he was keen to developing trade through membership services of fibre2fashion among African cotton business entities; disseminate information & knowledge on cotton among “cotton community” of Africa; connecting African cotton with world through intensive marketing; promotion & advertising efforts through online & offline; developing market linkages of African cotton with value chain and help conducting business networking meets & connectivity across the world.

More Textiles News - India...