Kochi: With the global community moving towards eco-friendly fibres, the opportunity before the coir industry are limitless. Exporters should be able to take advantage of the benefits of innovative designs to capture discerning customers in markets like the U.S. and Europe, K. Sugunendran, outgoing chairman of the Indian Coir Association, has said.

Addressing the 50th annual general meeting of the association here on Friday, Mr. Sugunendran said coir industry was second only to agriculture in the matter of providing employment and Kerala accounted for 95 per cent of the country's coir exports.

Even though Kerala was the largest producer of coconuts, the level of utilisation of coconut husks here was lower than in Tamil Nadu.

This was surprising, he said, adding that attempts made in the past to promote geo-textiles failed to give the desired results.

He wanted the coir exporters to widen the market access by penetrating the nascent markets and new markets. Innovation should be the watchword and the industry would be able to attain its true potential only through innovation, he said.

Mr. Sugunendran lauded the work of the Kalavur-based Central Coir Research Institute and for developing a semi-mechanical pneumatic loom for weaving coir mats, mattings, carpets and geo-textiles.

The leads made by the coir industry in the export of coir pith were also welcome. Last year, the country exported more than 50,000 tonnes of coir pith fetching about Rs.40 crore to the exchequer.

The manufacturers welcomed the efforts made by the Coir Board for better coir pith utilisation.

From an export of 48,879 tonnes (valued at Rs.528 lakhs) in 1947-48, the coir products exports had touched 1,36,027 metric tonnes valued at Rs.50,845 lakh in 2005-05. This gave a rough estimation of the growth in this sector.

An interesting fact was that in 1956, the country exported 63,457 metric tonnes of coir yarn and 18,896 metric tonnes of coir mats, mattings and rugs. Fifty years later, we exported 89,583 metric tonnes of coir yarn and 70,625 metric tonnes of coir mats, mattings and rugs. These figures were indicative of the fact that we were now exporting more and more value-added products.

If this trend continues, we would be able to achieve an export of one-lakh tonnes of mats and mattings by the year 2010, Mr. Sugunendran said.

The unit value also increased due to the high value of raw materials and high cost of production, he said.

Export of coir products from India during the period April 2005 to March 2006 was 1,36,026.97 MT valued at Rs.508.45 crore as against export of 1,22,926.78 MT valued at Rs.473.40 crore made during the corresponding period of the previous year.

The increase recorded in quantity is 13100.19 MT, that is 10.66 per cent and in value it is Rs.35.04 crore, that is 7.04 per cent, Mr. Sugunendran said.

The country achieved 103 per cent of the target in rupee terms. The export recorded an all time high in the last seven years.

During the period April 2005 to March 2006, export of handloom mats, tufted mats, powerloom mats, coir fibre, coir pith, rubberised coir and coir geo textiles showed an increase both in terms of value and quantity when compared to the previous year.

Items such as handloom mattings, powerloom mattings, coir rugs, and carpets, coir rope, coir other sorts and semi-finished items such as coir yarn decreased both in terms of quantity and value when compared to the corresponding period of the previous year.

Touching upon the problems on the traditional industry front, Mr. Sugunendran said the shortage of raw materials, fluctuations in dollar exchange rates, strikes and bandhs, etc continued to plague the industry.

It was also a good sign that the earlier practice of discussing the floor price, purchase price, government control on husk movement, cash subsidy gave way to modernisation and consensus in the industry.

The talk about R&D, environmental protection, how to increase production of fibre, how to make a good uniform yarn, how to survive the volatile movements of the U.S. dollar, non-availability of electricity for new projects, infrastructure facilities were now doing the rounds in the forward looking industry.

He lauded the Government for helping the ailing industry and for giving a fillip to solve the problems of the traditional sector.

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