Textiles industry sees huge job losses due to slowdown

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SME Times News Bureau | 14 Jun, 2012
The textiles industry, which employs about 45 million people, has seen around 3 to 4.5 million or 7-10 percent job losses in the sector due to the impact of slowdown in global markets, the Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) has said.

The AEPC estimates that around 3 to 4.5 million or 7-10 percent people have already lost their jobs in the textile sector in the last two years and still it is continuing. If the government will not intervene immediately, more and more people may lose their jobs.

"During the past three years, more than 125 cotton and man-made fibre textile mills have closed down in the country," Apparel Export Promotion Council Chairman A Sakthivel said.

In addition to slowdown in the US and Europe, which affects exports, the Indian textiles sector is also bearing high cost of credit and increase in raw material prices.

Sakthivel said that domestic banks are not cooperating and this is acting as a double-whammy for the sector, which is already in trouble due to economic crisis in the US and Europe. These two markets account for almost 65 percent of the country's textile exports.

"Banking is one of the biggest problems for the industry," he added.