The handloom business in India has enormous potential to generate additional cash and job opportunities for the country. The Government of India has launched a number of programmes and projects to improve and standardise the handloom sector. The National Handloom Development Programme (NHDP) is being revised and executed in order to achieve integrated and comprehensive development of handlooms and handloom weavers’ welfare. The plan aims to assist handloom weavers, Self-Help Groups, NGOs, and other handloom co-operative societies with raw material acquisition, technological advancement, and marketing of their handloom products.
Objectives
The programme is being redesigned and implemented with the following goals in mind:
- To improve the socio-economic standing of the country’s 43 lakh weavers and associated workers.
- To create more job possibilities for the underprivileged and minorities.
- Improving production and meeting demand for handloom items in national and international markets.
- Through proper supply chain management, the handloom sector will be systemized and organised.
- Bridge the sector’s gap and enable supply chain management through infrastructure enhancement, innovative technologies, and product development in response to market needs.
- To boost the weavers’ pay for handloom items.
Handloom Marketing Assistance
The goal of handloom marketing assistance is to build and promote marketing channels in both the domestic and export markets by connecting the two in a holistic and integrated manner. The following sub-components will be included in the handloom marketing support components:
Promotion of Domestic Marketing
Domestic Marketing Promotion is a sub-component that encompasses all marketing efforts such as the organisation of expos, events, and craft melas. Registered users of the handloom mark are eligible to participate in the expos, which are conducted in 14 of the country’s major cities.
Initiative for Market Access
The sub-component works to engage handloom workers in a well-known handloom cluster in order to expand handloom products. Handloom weavers are also given apprenticeship programmes and are taught how to market their handloom products through the Fashion Design Council and establish a marketing link for their products. The Central Government has set out Rs.1 crore for every cluster to implement the sub-component across the country.
Development of Marketing Infrastructure
The sub-component intends to build urban haats with an estimated size of 8000 Sq. Mts in each city to boost the export of handloom products and to display samples and finished products in one location. The fund of Rs.3 crores required for the establishment of urban haats is allocated and shared by the Office of the Development Commissioner for Handlooms and the State Government.
Promotion of Handloom Exports
The sub-component seeks to find and help handloom organisations and corporations in exporting their products through participation in international trade fairs and buyer-seller meetings.
Concessional credit
The Component’s goal is to provide handloom weavers with finance at low-interest rates. The components’ sub-components are as follows:
- Interest Subsidy
The sub-component intends to provide handloom weavers with subsidised loans at a reduced rate of 6% for a three-year term.
- Margin Money Assistance
Handloom weavers, self-help organisations, and joint liability groups are granted a sum of Rs.10000 per weaver to leverage for bank loans.
- Credit Guarantee
The Credit Guarantee Fund Trust for Medium and Small Enterprises guarantees bank loans made to handloom weavers (CGTMSE). The Government of India pays the annual charge for the credit guarantee service for a period of three years beginning with the date of loan disbursement from the bank.
- Bunker Facilitator
Banks are authorised to hire a Bunkar Facilitator to collect and process loan applications. These facilitators are concerned with the project’s completion, the submission of an application to the bank branch, and post-sanction monitoring until the loan is disbursed. For onward payment to the Bunkar Facilitator, the Government of India reimburses an incentive of 0.5 per cent of the loan amount issued by the bank, subject to a minimum of Rs.200 and a maximum of Rs.2000 per loan.
- Handloom Census
A third-party handloom census and its data on the following factors are conducted in order to acquire modernised statistics on the handloom sector, along with the issuing of Identity Cards to handloom weavers and affiliated workers.
- The number of weavers who use handlooms
- Count of handlooms
- The number of handlooms in commercial and home use, for example.