4-day Indian Handicrafts & Gifts Fair to begin Monday

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Saurabh Gupta | 17 Feb, 2014
The four-day-long 37th edition of Indian Handicrafts & Gifts Fair (IHGF) Spring, 2014, being organized by the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH), will begin Monday at India Expo Centre & Mart, Greater Noida, for promoting Handicrafts trade from the country.

Dr. K.S. Rao, Union Minister of Textiles will be inaugurating the fair. Minister of State for Textiles Panabaaka Lakshmi shall preside over the ceremony, Zohra Chatterji, Secretary (Textiles) shall be Guest of Honour, S.S. Gupta, Development Commissioner ( Handicrafts) will also grace the occasion.

During the fair, Maria Clemencia Rodriguez De Santos, First Lady of Republic of Colombia, will launch the facility of "Mobile Application of IHGF", an EPCH initiative, for the ease of the visiting buyers to find out products and companies of their interest.

This facility can be accessed on Smart Phones through Google Play and App Store on http://epch.in/mobile Information on Companywise exhibitors, Productwise exhibitors, fair facilities, free shuttle, hotels, helplines about International airlines, Indian Railways, National Bus Transportation etc. can be viewed and accessed by the buyers holding smart phones.

The Handicrafts Fair this year will have more than 2650 exhibitors including 900 permanent marts, drawn from various regions and states of India displaying a very wide variety of Handicrafts at this show. Out of total 2650 exhibitors, 587 are from Central region, 143 eastern region, 519 from Northern region, 402 from North-West (Rajasthan), 43 from Southern region and 46 from Western region.

The major product categories will be Houseware, Home textiles, Furniture, Cane and Bamboo, X-Mas decorations, Fashion Jewellery and Lamp & Lighting. Lace craft from Narsapur, Andhra Pradesh will also be on display.

The fair which was initiated by EPCH in the year 1994 held twice a year and has become so popular in the world market that it attracts large number of overseas buyers in each edition of the fair who come to source their requirements from Indian companies participating at this fair.

The Council has been organizing the Indian Handicrafts & Gifts Fair with the intention of providing a platform to the exporting community and to the importing community of the world to conduct business based on mutual interest.

Rakesh Kumar, Executive Director of EPCH, informed that the uniqueness of the products showcased at this fair will continue to be the domination of hand crafted and hand made products where machines are used only for finishing purposes. Though hand crafted products are displayed at many other fairs in the world but it is also a known fact that hand crafted products produced in countries like China, Taiwan, Korea, Indonesia etc. are predominantly machine made and hand work is done only for finishing. This is the reason that these countries cater to bulk orders in thousands and millions.

Unlike this, India still have predominance of hand crafted and hand made products and this is the reason that India offers uniqueness in craftsmanship, finish and presentation which brings further value addition.

Lekhraj Maheshwari, Chairman - EPCH added that the product range on display at the fair will be suitable for meeting requirement of all types of buyers ranging from low, middle and top end consumers. It is expected that large number of buyers from all across the globe shall be visiting the fair for sourcing their requirements of handicrafts.

Handicrafts exports registered an increase of 38.5 percent in Rupee terms and 22.15 percent in dollar terms during 2012-13 over the previous year. The exports during first 10 months of the current fiscal is Rs. 16,786.24 crores. Export target of Rs. 24,500 crores during 2013-14 will be surpassed, elaborated by Executive Director of EPCH.