Domestic technical textiles Industry Segment-wise consumption of ...

In addition, woven crop-covers are also used around the world. The simplest and most economical
form of crop covers are the direct or floating covers with no sustaining wire or cane hoops.
The primary raw material, Polypropylene is available locally. (Reliance Industries Ltd is the largest
manufacturer).
Market dynamics and key growth drivers
The discussions with the manufacturers have revealed that the domestic market size of crop-covers is
insignificant. However, the Indian market holds a great potential for the non-woven crop covers. It is
estimated that the ultimate potential area requiring crop covers is one million hectares. But, in the
absence of any government policy for promoting the use of crop-covers in India, the domestic
consumption has not picked up.
The manufacturers cater to the export demand from the middle-east countries like UAE, Oman, as
well as developed countries like UK and USA. The demand from these countries is the most
important factor affecting the industry. The future performance of the industry depends on value
addition and new product development apart from cost competitiveness.
Key manufacturers and exporters
Unimin India Ltd, Fiberweb India Ltd, KK Non-woven and KT Exports are the major manufacturers
and exporters of crop covers in India apart from Surya Textech (Chandigarh) and Vimal Industries
(Himanchal Pradesh).
Manufacturer Year Product Production Installed
quantity** capacity
Unimin 2007-08 SBPF 165 MT*
Fiberweb India
Non-woven
Jan-Dec, 2007 fabrics
(spunbond)
3,312 MT 4,000 MT
Source: Capitaline, Annual reports, Industry survey
* The production of SBPF at Unimin India has dropped from 2,243 MT in 2005-06 to 165 MT in 2007-08
because of on-going operational issues in the plant.
**The non-woven fabric is sold for other applications also
Market size of crop-covers and future forecast
The domestic consumption of crop-covers is negligible (as discussed with manufacturers). Plastic
sheets or low tunnels are used instead of crop-covers in India. Hence, the total size of the industry is
equivalent to exports. Since there is no focus on crop-covers in the XIth plan, the usage of crop-covers
is not expected to pick-up in India over the next 5 years. Once the production at Unimin picks up
again, the total production of crop-covers is expected to increase considerably. Several other units