Madurai spinners association has appealed to the Prime Minister to stop export of cotton waste from the country and save open end spinning industry from impeding doom.
Textile industry is the second largest job providing industry in our country. Till concept of Open End (OE) spinning was introduced in the country in middle of 80’s, all waste cotton generated in spinning sector was primarily sold for making mattresses, paper industry and some quantity was used for currency printing also.
After introduction of open end machines and consequently using cotton waste to spin coarse count yarns thereby adding value, many subsidiary units with two and three open end spinning frames have come up in the small scale sector employing a large number of workers.
Now because of the global scarcity of short staple fibers, OE spinners from other countries are sourcing cotton waste from India. Since there are no restrictions on export of cotton and cotton waste most of the cotton wastes are being exported to China and other countries.
By doing so availability of cotton waste to open end spinning units in the country has come down drastically and has also resulted in prices rising by nearly 50%. Many of the open end spinning mills have partially or completely closed down.
This has led to a cascading effect on exports of up stream products like terry towels, carpets, sheeting, home textiles and exports in this segment is expected to reduce drastically.
The present spindlage in India is totally 410 lakhs, producing nearly 135 lakh Kgs of yarn. The waste generated from these activities is to the tune of 27 lakh Kgs. While capacity of open end spinning industry is 5.8 lakh rotors with a total production of nearly 23.2 lakh Kgs of yarn.
Cotton waste to tune of 27 lakh Kgs is being generated daily by the spinning mills which is sufficient to keep rotors of O.E units running without interruption. Now on an average 7.5 lakh Kgs of cotton waste is being exported on a daily basis. This has resulted in shortage in domestic market consequently leading to a spurt in prices of up to 50%.
This has led to increase in prices of OE yarn and will have a cascading effect on upstream products and ultimately affect exports of terry towels, carpets, home textiles, grey sheeting’s, canvas fabrics, dust sheets etc. If further exports of cotton waste is allowed open end spinning industry will become unviable and sick and will force many units to close.
The spinners association has appealed to the Prime Minister to do the needful by stopping all exports of cotton waste and save OE industry as well as upstream exporters from ultimate doom.
