The Expenditure Finance Committee of India has approved the Technology Mission on Technical Textiles (TMTT), reported Seshadri Ramkumar of Texas Tech University (TTU).
Four new Centers of Excellence (CoE) will be created in addition to the existing four centers. The eight centers will have an investment of $40 million. The four new centers will be created with an investment of $22.2 million. The plans include a center exclusively for nonwovens and another center for composite materials. The four existing centers that focus on geotextiles, medical textiles, protective textiles and agro textiles have received $9.8 million. An additional investment of $8 million will be disbursed to these four centers to enhance their research and development capabilities, according to Mr. Ramkumar.
The major thrust of the TMTT is to boost the growth of the technical textiles industry which includes, industrial fabrics, coating, nonwovens and converting sectors. The TMTT will assist entrepreneurs and researchers to enhance process, product and marketing knowhow in technical textiles. India's technical textiles sector is estimated to grow at an annual rate of 11%.