Minister urges textile industry to focus on value-addition: SMOT programme inaugurated

Minister for Textile Industry, Chaudhry Mushtaq Ali Cheema has said that government is conscious of the issues of women development and is fully committed to the enhancement of the status of women on the grounds of equity and equality.
Inaugurating the two-month Stitching Machine Operators Training (SMOT) Programme at Chenab Limited, which was jointly organised by the Textile Garments Skill Development Board and Ministry of Textile Industry, he announced that 75 percent quota would be given to women for this job-oriented programme.
He urged the textile sector to focus on value addition to yield maximum benefit of textile package, which would be implemented, with the total cost of Rs 25 billion. The minister further asked industrialists and exporters to do research and study on the latest trends to increase competitiveness of their goods to get better share of market.
He said that textile industry is the core industry of Pakistan and due to 'Textile Vision 2005' adopted by the government has provided substantial development to this sector. Cheema said the this export oriented sector needed to strive more to take full advantage of the government policies including recently announced Textile Package 2006.
He further said that the garment cities of Lahore and Faisalabad would be made functional within a period of one year. The buildings equipped with every facility would be provided to industrialists in garment cities on lease basis. They would just need to install machinery and start business there, he added. The main purpose is to make establishment of textile factory including small ancillary units cheaper by saving major portion of investment in acquiring land and building.
Presenting the Outlook of SMOT Programme, the Chief Executive of Chenab Limited Mian Muhammad Latif said that this programme has been devised to cater to the need of the textile industry in the field of apparel fashions and home textiles. It is meant to build skilled workforce for this huge industry. The training course covers basic techniques of sewing, handling of stitching machines and knowledge of their accessories with methodology of different sewing operations, he added.
Mian Latif, who is also the Chairman of FIEDMC, mentioned that after enhancing expertise in the field of sewing, Chenab Limited would be able to confidently compete with major business rivals China, India and Bangladesh in Apparel Fashions and Home Textiles fields.
He pointed out that Pakistani apparel industry is currently facing many formidable challenges such as shortage of skilled labour, technology advancement and a cut throat competition in the global market.
Mian Latif hoped that our industry should develop human resource in an effective manner by providing their workers on-job-training to cope with the fast changing apparel fashion scenario in the world and upcoming challenges to the apparel industry. This would give us a considerable edge over our competitors across the globe, he added.