Goyal also highlighted innovation as a key factor in India becoming a Developed Nation

India's textile industry has a big role to play in making Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with other countries a success, Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said on Wednesday.

Delivering the keynote address at the 10th Asian Textiles Conference TEXCON on the theme- 'Reimagining the Textile and Apparel Industry for the next Decade', Goyal said that FTAs with Developed Countries is high on the agenda of Modi Government.

Pointing out that innovation is going to be the defining feature in India's march towards becoming a Developed Nation, the Commerce and Industry Minister highlighted the role of innovation across all value chains in the Textile sector.

He urged the Textile sector to focus on recycling and digitization. If the industry focuses on innovation, sustainability, digitisation, newer products and utilisation of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), it can grow fast and compete with the best in the world, he said. Goyal also noted that the textiles sector can reduce the pressure on the environment by using reusable resources as well as reduce its own production costs.

Referring to digitisation, he said this is another area which can help optimise the entire value chain in the sector. He expressed satisfaction at the fact that the industry captains are talking about digitisation. In current era of information technology, every industry is benefitting from new technologies like blockchain and more.

He also suggested that the industry should think about high quality products and elementary products like zip and embellishments, which the Indian textile industry imports at present.