Textiles to barely manage last year's figures

AHMEDABAD: As the fiscal draws to an end, textile experts are confirming the worst fears of the Indian textile and clothing sector.

The sector that commanded a market share of $51 billion in 2007-08 might just stop short of $50 billion in 2008-09, thanks to a stagnating demand from domestic and global consumers.

Joint secretary at the ministry of textiles JN Singh told ET on Wednesday that India would just manage to hold on to $50 billion marketsize in 2008-09.

"There could be a small 2-2.5% correction by the time we have the statistics with us towards fiscal end. In times of economic meltdown, it is fortunate that we will be able to maintain the marketsize for a consecutive year," he said.

India that saw $21 billion exports of textile and clothing in 2007-08, had a domestic marketsize of $29-30 billion during the period.

In the current fiscal however, there has been a degrowth in the US and EU markets for Indian exporters and a simultaneous stagnation in the domestic market.

"Contrary to our expectations of 15% growth in exports, our exports are feared to fall by 3% in 2008-09 owing to drastic fall in demands from US and EU markets.

Even in the domestic market, against the growth of 10%, we expect to see a mere 2-3% growth in the current fiscal owing to lack of consumer confidence in the current economic crisis," added Prashant Agarwal of Technopak.

Confederation of Indian Textile Industry���s secretary general DK Nair indicated that considering these are tough times for the textile sector, it should consider itself fortunate to have managed a flat growth.

"It is fortunate that we have been able to hold on to our marketsize without seeing any significant dip in these times," he said.