Wednesday, July 9, 2008

[ Technical Textiles - Better Late than Never ]

Photo: K.Ananthan.
Plans to aid medical textile industry.
M. Soundariya Preetha.
NICHE AREA: Materials such as gauze will be the focus of SITRA’s project. –
COIMBATORE: The Union Ministry of Textiles has identified the South India Textile Research Association based here as a centre of excellence for medical textiles production. Association director Arindam Basu told The Hindu that the centre would get about Rs. 10 crore over a period of three years to establish the required facilities that would help the development of the specialised line. Of this, Rs. 3 crore would come this year.
Four main activities were planned. These include the establishment of a laboratory with international accreditation, a testing and evaluation system, an information technology-supported information base and training programmes for personnel of the industry. A video-conferencing facility would also be created. Mr. Basu said the work had started. Within a year, many of the facilities would be ready.
Coimbatore has a large number of hospitals and several units are already into medical textiles in Tamil Nadu. The aim of the centre is to help entrepreneurs produce items with the existing machinery and with minimum investment, he said. The centre would have dedicated personnel trained in medical textiles.
He said the association planned to start testing facilities first.
This would help the units already producing medical textiles to test their products and get the required certification. The information system would have details related to medical textiles, such as fibre and machinery suppliers.
The Ministry had commissioned a study on technical textiles.
The report was expected by September. This would give an idea about the size of the domestic medical textile industry and the demand for these products.
The centre would bring in international experts to create awareness among local entrepreneurs on various medical textile products, he said. It would organise seminars and workshops for the local industry.
The Ministry had established centres of excellence for geo textiles, protective textiles and agricultural textiles too as part of its efforts to promote technical textile production in the country.
SOURCE
http://www.hindu.com

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