With a steep hike in cotton yarn prices by some of the textile mills recently, the value-adding textile units have sought measures to bring down the prices.
The garment units are expected to slow down purchase of yarn for the next few days and the mills are also expected to bring down cotton purchase for two weeks, till cotton arrivals pick up.
The price of 40s count cotton yarn increased 60 % in the last one year, said A. Sakthivel, chairman of Apparel Export Promotion Council. Apparel exporters are unable to book orders and the textile mill associations should urge their members to bring stability to yarn prices, he said. The governments should also take steps to control yarn exports and talk to all the stakeholders, he said.
The South India Hosiery Manufacturers’ Association said the Cotton Corporation of India should ensure that MSME textile mills get cotton at affordable prices and it should not increase prices of cotton when the arrivals slow down. The Central and State governments should ensure stability of cotton and yarn prices, it said.
According to K. Gopalakrishnan, president of Karur Textile Manufacturers and Exporters’ Association, the yarn price hike threatens to stifle the growth of the entire textile sector. The cost of other inputs are also on the rise and the exporters are losing the confidence of the international buyers.
Ravi Sam, chairman of Southern India Mills’ Association, said price of Sankar-6 variety of cotton has increased from ₹ 55,000 per candy during the beginning of September to ₹ 67,000 per candy now.
On the recent yarn price increase by a few spinning mills manufacturing hosiery yarn in the State, Mr. Ravi Sam said these mills had not increased the yarn price for the past three months though the cotton price increased over ₹12,000 per candy during the same period. Though these mills were hoping for reduction in cotton prices to maintain the same yarn price, spurt in cotton prices have forced these mills to increase the yarn price by around ₹ 50 per kg. Majority of the hosiery yarn manufacturing spinning mills increased the yarn prices steadily and the increase is to the tune to ₹ 60- ₹ 70 per kg for the same counts especially in North India. He also advised the spinning mills to be cautious and extend full cooperation to the downstream sectors so that the country continued to get the increased demand opportunities in the domestic and international markets.
T. Rajkumar, Chairman of Confederation of Indian Textile Industry, has appealed to the Prime Minister to intervene to stabilise the cotton prices. He sought Cotton Price Stabilisation Fund Scheme comprising 5% interest subvention or loan at NABARD rate of interest and reduction in margin money from 25% to 10% apart from increase in the cotton working capital limit from three to nine months.
