The Centre today offered a textile park to Odisha as the state did not have such a facility.
"Though there are 63 textile parks across the country, Odisha does not have such a facility. Therefore, the Centre will like to have such a textile park in the state," Union Textile Minister Santhosh Kumar Gangwar said while attending the National Workshop on Promotion of Handloom with Fashion here.
The textile industry has good prospects for the economy and employment opportunities, Gangwar said.
"Though the textile parks were earlier being developed in private initiative, now the Centre had changed the guidelines in order to encourage the state governments to come up with proposals," he said.
Stating that the Centre would receive applications for the textile parks till February 15, Gangwar said he would like the Odisha government make a move to set up a textile park here.
"We will specially consider the applications of the state governments where there is no textile parks," he said.
"The Centre's support for the integrated textile park by way of grant will be limited to 40 per cent of the project cost subject to a celling of Rs 40 crore," Gangwar told reporters after the meeting.
Gangwar said that the Centre was also interested for a incubation centre at the National Institute of Fashion Designining, Bhubaneswar.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who inagurated the National Workshop on Promotion of Handloom with Fashion, said NIFT's efforts will take the handloom works to global fashion community and help improve the economic condition of the state's weavers and srtisans.
"Traditional handloom products by rural weavers and artisans from the across the country don't get proper price of their labour because of lack of proper market and designs.
Design Sutra will bring designers and handloom weavers together to help them come up with new ideas," said director general of NIFT, Prem Kumar Gera.