Leather Exports Unaffected By Asian Crisis

The Southeast Asian currency crisis has had a negligible impact on leather exports from India, Council for Leather Exports chairman M Rafeeque Ahmed said yesterday.

Addressing a joint press conference here on the eve of the three-day leather research industry get together, Ahmed said Indian tanneries should utilise the situation to their advantage and gear up to target more exports.

Unido regional director A Sahasranaman, who was also present, said the day was not far when international buyers would demand that leather purchased by them bore an international eco-label and that finished leather was only from tanneries equipped with effluent treatment plants or shared such plants.

He said the tanneries in the country should fully exploit the steep fall in the price of raw American leather due to the depreciation of some Asian currencies.

Raw leather can be imported, processed and still be resold in the international marketed at competitive rates, he added.

Central Leather Research Institute director T Ramasami said the Union government had asked the institute to prepare a nine-year perspective (1997-2005) for development of skill and technology upgradation.

A framework document has since been presented to the Cenu, he said.

The CLRI, he said, had commenced drawing up a successor programme for full utilisation of human resources in the leather sector as a follow-up to the technology campaign launched by the institute a couple of years ago, which had benefited small manufactures of leather chappals from Karnataka and Maharashtra.

He claimed that in terms of talent and human resources the country was second to none. In some sectors we could even claim to be on equal terms as developed countries, he said.

Referring to colour predictions, Ramasami claimed that of the 19 colours predicted to be the most sought after in the first half of 1998 by Europeans, 14 were made in India.

Last year, nine of the 39 colours predictions were by the Indian leather industry, Ramasami said.

Terming the countrys success in predictions as a major breakthrough, he said today India is forging ahead in the fashion leather world with respect to colours of leather.

The CLRIs vision was to emerge as the global leader in leather research by 2005, he said, adding the institute had a commitment to ensure that advanced technologies did not pollute the environment.