By Aroonim Bhuyan, IANS
Dubai : Indian textile products have a better brand credibility than Chinese products that are flooding the markets across the world, according to Indian Textiles Minister Shankarsinh Vaghela.
“It is no point comparing Chinese textile products with India’s. The ‘Made in India’ brand has extremely good credibility across the world,” Vaghela said at a press conference here Monday evening.
The minister is leading a high-level delegation on a four-nation tour to promote Indian textile exports and attract foreign direct investment in the textiles industry. After visiting Istanbul, Athens and Cairo, the delegation reached this west Asian commercial hub Saturday.
“Yes, we cannot compete with Chinese textile products in terms of prices but so is the case with all other goods. But in all the markets that we visited this time, we found that the brand credibility of Indian products is much better than China’s,” he said.
He, however, added that the appreciation of the rupee has hurt India’s textile sector.
“The rupee appreciation has hurt the textile industry in terms of exports and our exports fell last year.”
The minister has invited investors in the United Arab Emirates to invest in India’s textile sector.
“We have invited potential investors in the UAE to invest in India’s textile sector with 100 percent equity through the automatic route,” Vaghela said, adding that his delegation’s mission is not only to promote exports of India’s textile products but also to attract foreign direct investment in India’s textile sector.
Of India’s total exports of $12 billion to the UAE, exports of textile products stand at $1 billion. India’s total textile exports across the world amounts to $19 billion.
“We got very positive response from potential investors here. I was pleasantly surprised to see so many people expressing interest in investing in India and having friendly ties with India,” he said.
Qaiser Shamim, joint secretary in the Ministry of Textiles, who is accompanying the minister, said that textile merchants in this Gulf nation have promised more imports from India.
“The Textile Merchants Group here, whom we met, have promised to increase imports from India by at least 20 to 30 percent,” he said
Vaghela met UAE’s Minister for Planning and Economy Sheikha Lubna bint Khalid Al Qasimi in Abu Dhabi Monday morning.
The delegation was also given a presentation by the Jebel Ali free port zone near here about the facilities it offered.
“The talks with the authorities of the Jebel Ali free zone authorities have been extremely fruitful,” Shamim said.