Textile slowdown may affect Vibrant Summit

If the fears of the state government are to be believed, then the textile investments during the upcoming Vibrant Gujarat Global Investor's Summit 2009 may not be as high as expected, thanks to the global meltdown.

Few months ago, the Gujarat government was expecting memorandums of understanding (MoUs) worth Rs 10,000 crore in textile sector during the summit.

Nevertheless, textile biggies like Raymond, Reliance Industries Limited and Welspun have shown consistent interest for signing the MoUs for either for setting up greenfield projects or for expansion of capacities in verticals like wool spinning mills, polyester yarn, terry towels and knitted garments.

“The amount of investment that the government had been expecting few months back may not be achieved. While so far some major textile companies have come calling to Gujarat, we fear the effect of global meltdown will discourage others, thereby reducing the expected investments,” said a senior government official.

Apart from Indian textile companies, the government has also been several textile machinery manufacturers from China, Taiwan and Korea to set up base in Gujarat. Since a major focus this year would be technical textiles, some of the investments are expected in this segment with players like CTM Technical Textiles, Vinod Fabrics and Jaynon Exports likely to sign MoUs for the same. The summit is also expected feature a buyer-seller meet for the textile industry for which the government is luring some international brands like Marks and Spencer, J C Penny and Armani. During the last Vibrant Gujarat Global Investor's Summit 2007, the industry had witnessed MoUs worth Rs 8,500 crore being signed. Of these, around 85 per cent of projects are believed to be either under implementation or have commissioned.