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Narasimha Reddy
Diagnostic Study
0f Handloom Silk and Cotton Cluster
Chandur
(Andhra Pradesh)
Submitted to
Director (Handloom and Textiles)
Dept. of H&T
Govt. of Andhra Pradesh
Hyderabad
Submitted By
Chetana Society
201, Aarthi Residency, LN colony, Saidabad, Hyderabad
Ph. 09010203842
E-Mail: chethanhyd@gmail.com
Executive Summary
Chandur cluster is famous for its intricate tie & dye design saris.
The export market for sari is limited though it is rich in art and
tradition.
Chandur has never faced a set back before. But now it is a stagnant
handloom cluster. The quality and design of the products is
gradually improving. The only drawback is the products are costly
and cannot reach low end segment of the market. The product
needs to be diversified to suit the domestic as well as export
market.
The core cluster actors are small weavers, Master Weavers and the
lone cooperative society. This cooperative society was running in
losses because of which they are not able to take proper care of its
members. As a result, members are forced to take shelter of the
master weavers. The Chandur Cooperative Society Limited is one of
the biggest primary cooperatives of the state once running in profit.
It is the pioneer of all cooperatives in the area and has done a lot of
development for the handloom industry.
There are no good, quality dyeing units here. A dyeing unit is a dire
need here.
CHAPTER 1
BACKGROUND
Chetana Society for the past five years has been intensively
involved in issues related to handloom sector. It has been a
pioneer in producing information and also taking positive
initiatives to demonstrate the competitiveness and viability of
handloom production.
1.2 Methodology
CHAPTER 2
2.1 An Overview
2.6 Export
There is no authentic information and/or estimation on exports
from Chandur.
2.7 Structure
Here, handloom sector consists of a set of handloom weavers
and intermediaries. There are distinctive patterns, though the
lines among various typologies are not sharp and change.
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
SUPPORT ENVIRONMENT
4.6 Credit
While the formal or institutional credit has passed by the
sector, informal systems thrive.
4.7 Infrastructure
This impacts productivity, output and profitability in a
marginal way. The key issues are housing, roads, drains and
electricity. The houses, once, used to be decent sized. The
families, during last few decades, grew but economic status
declined. The houses got divided; became smaller and
cramped. In many houses, it is almost impossible to work
without electricity. Some houses leak in rainy season;
affecting tempo of production in September, around which
time peak season begins. There are weavers who are used to
listening to tape-recorded music or watch TV while they
weave. The power supply at Chandur is erratic. So, many
weavers are forced to idle, when power goes off. The cramped
housing and congested surroundings cause family squabbles;
dissipating productive energy.
CHAPTER 5
Analysis of Business Operation in the Cluster
Yarn
Sourcing, degumming,
twisting and dyeing
Design
Pre-loom Generation, selection, graph-
Operations making and card-making for
the loom
Weaving of
Fabric/Sareee
Post-weaving Operations
Packing, Buti-cutting, polish
(at retail outlet level)
16/50 Chetana Society
Dr. D. Narasimha Reddy
5.2 Design
There is all round acknowledgement of the importance of
design.
CHAPTER 6
SURVEY ANALYSIS
Chandur Survey
hunger. There are instances where weavers have changed their job
to some other lines in order to survive.
Most of the weavers here undertake only job work of weaving from
the master weavers/traders. The basic reason for this is that they
do not have sufficient market knowledge and information about the
relevant trade and they do not have investing capability for the
purchase of raw materials, working capital, marketing expenses etc.
Hence, the weavers work on the meager wages received from the
master weavers.
Analysis of the data was done based on the linked factors. No cross
relational analysis has been done. It is obvious that cross-relational
analysis would provide a better insight on the issues and enable
targeted planning of programmes.
i. Age
It can be seen that most of the weavers are in the productive
range, between 21-50 years. In fact, most of the spouses, who are
necessarily women, are in younger ranges.
Table 1: Age
Head of the Spouses
Range in years family
Number
Below 20 and below 0 7
21-30 59 128
31-40 106 97
41-50 79 80
51-60 87 25
61-80 24 3
Total 355 340
Age Comparison
140
120
100
Number
80 Men weavers
60 Women weavers
40
20
0
20 and 21-30 31-40 41-50 51-60 61-80
below
Range in years
ii. Education
Table 2: Education
Standard Head of the family Spouses
Degree 12 -
Intermediate 26 4
Tenth Class 57 55
7 class and above
th
69 66
Below 7 class
th
110 72
Illiterates 81 150
Total 355 347
160
140
120
100
80 No. of Weavers
60
40
20
0
1-10 yr 11-20 yr 21-30 31 and above
No. of weavers
v. Assets
There are no worksheds – all of them weave from their own homes.
Out of 355 families, 324 are white card holders. Others do not have
any cards. Of the surveyed 355 families, 296 are living in their own
houses, and 55 are living in rented houses.
There are 221 houses with slab and concrete. About 62 families live
in mud houses, while 59 live under asbestos sheets. Thus, atleast
121 families do not have proper housing. Condition of the houses is
not related to houses. However, it was observed that most of the
houses would require some repair or the other, primarily to improve
the working and living conditions. Asbestos roofing would be the
most horrible, given the environmental conditions. These families
require some attention for improvement.
Most of the weavers are living in the low roof height huts/ with tiled
roof or asbestos /tin sheets/terracota tiles. Frame looms cannot be
accommodated in these houses. Hence they are using pit looms for
weaving silk fabrics. Moreover pit looms are much cheaper when
Most of the weavers have their own looms. There are a few who
work as hired labour. After proper verification, focus needs to be
given to these weavers for their upliftment.
Among 355 respondents, there are 364 looms that are working.
Among these, 64 are involved in cotton production, 280 are in silk
production and 2 are involved in both silk and cotton production.
viii. Earnings
Earnings of these weavers are very low. About 11 families earn less
than Rs.1000, and about 309 families earn less than Rs.3000. given
the average of 4 member-families, these earnings are very low.
They are not sufficient for proper living costs leave alone for
developmental costs such as education. However, earnings of 7
families are above average, indicating that there is potential for
increasing incomes if proper support is provided.
x. Membership
While many of them are members of the local cooperative society, it
is obvious that they do not benefit from such membership. Almost
123 families are not members, probably indicating that the reach of
the cooperative has not extended beyond Chandur town, and also
there could be migrants.
This cooperative was once a vibrant body, and has been a pioneer
in providing work to its members and also in marketing its products,
overcoming pretty steep odds in yesteryears.
xii. Loans
It is obvious that they would require loans given the gap between
income and expenditure. While more than 150 families have availed
the bank loan facilities, an equal number do not have such access.
However, despite access to bank loans, many had access to private
loans as well. But this has proved to be burdensome for many
families. The survey did no go into details such as the purpose for
which loans were taken. It will be interesting to see how many of
these loans are related to production, and not for other purposes.
It is obvious that their loan replaying capacity is very low, given the
low earnings and higher expenditures. Many did not mention their
x. Opinions of weavers
When asked about the reasons for their present condition, nineteen
weavers felt markets are dull and down, as a cause of their
problems. Twenty seven weavers felt it is due to less wages. About
131 weavers did not have any idea of what is happening. About 61
weavers said market is available for their production. Three weavers
blamed rise in yarn prices as the cause of the problem.
About 111 weavers felt they do not require any training’s. On the
other hand, 231 weavers opined that they require training. Others
did not offer any opinion.
CHAPTER 7
DIAGNOSIS OF THE CLUSTER AND COMMON PROBLEM
CHAPTER 8
SWOT ANALYSIS
STRENGTH
• Traditional Value
• Availability of skilled weavers
WEAKNESS
• Dependency on one product
• Highly unorganized cluster
• Poor quality of dying
• Low credit from financial institutions
• Town infrastructure is bad
• Brand Equity of product is declining
• Decline in wages of weavers
• No regular work for weavers
OPPORTUNITY
• Brand Building
• Product diversification
• Exploration of new market
• Export
• Reduction in custom duties on Yarn
• Product/Design patenting
THREAT
• Competition from other clusters
• Decline in demand of Saree
• Increase in demand of value added products
• Increase in demand for low cost power loom products
Conclusions
Thus, any programme that aims to work for their upliftment has to
consider the following:
CHAPTER 10
VISION
CHAPTER 11
STRATEGY AND ACTION PLAN
Strategy
The key challenge lies in building vibrant institutional or
organizational apparatus. The building of necessary
organizational initiatives, their trial run, emergence and
stabilization of leadership and management structures within
these organizations and acquisition of some amount of
autonomy by them in terms of prioritization of tasks and
manner of performing them are the preconditions for cluster-
revival and growth. The organizational development work will
take at least a year.
While some direct cluster-improvement action is needed to
trigger interest and to provide a meeting ground, it is important
to hold back major investment programmes until organizational
development is achieved. This is also essential to avoid the
programme getting positioned as “external assistance
programme” and the stakeholders vying merely for a slice of
individual benefit.
A critical task is dialoguing with weavers, designers, dyers,
trades and support institutions to create a platform for market
and technology initiatives. It should evolve over a period of one
year so that the various constituents develop a consensual
agenda and leadership emerges.
B Dyeing
This is a major gap in the prevailing technology package at
Chandur, hurting product quality and hence market prospects.
We propose two-fold action.
First, a dyeing technology team in which trade expert is
included should undertake work on best practices and marginal
improvements within the broad parameters - space, batch-
quantity, batch-time, capital expenditure - of existing dyeing
practices at Chandur.
The proposals for additional capital expenditure to improve
technology are welcome but we should not expect dyer to bear,
say, an amount higher than Rs. 25000/-. The additional capital
expenditure should not be heavily subsidized. If subsidy is
essential, it should not exceed 50% of capacity. Thus, the
group should keep in mind a ceiling of Rs. 50,000 in terms of
fresh capacity.
C Design
The design is the most dominant feature of Chandur product
offering and hence is a determinant of market volume. The
objectives of design-focussed work are as follows.
• To orient Chandur design, without undermining its
traditional core, to the needs of present market at one level,
and at another, to elevate it to the status of shaping
aesthetic tastes and fashion trends in the Indian market
place
• To create designs, particularly in the lower-end segment,
which cannot be easily copied on power loom
Action Plan
YEAR 1
Sr.
Activity
No.
1 Understanding the cluster and interaction with cluster actors
2 Awareness Workshops – formation of SHGs of weavers
4 Technology Upgradation Workshop on Dyeing
5 Dialogues with NABARD and other institution such as DRDA
6 Workshops on Marketing
7 Establishment of Information and Resource Center
8 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
Workshop for Local designers for providing them knowledge
9
about the latest trends and demands
10 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
11 Review of progress of SHG formation
12 Growth program for new and existing entrepreneurs
13 Updradation and addition of Looms
14 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
15 Participation/Organising in Buyer Seller Meet
16 Review of progress of SHG formation
17 Review of Information and Resource Center
YEAR 2
Sr.
Activity
No.
1 Capacity Building/Skill upgradation program for weavers
2 Publication of common catalogue of cluster
3 Workshops on Marketing
4 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
5 Capacity Building Workshop for Local designers
6 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
7 Product/Design Development Workshop
8 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
9 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
10 Updradation and addition of Looms
11 Participation in Trade Fairs
12 Launching of common web portal
13 Review of progress of SHG formation
14 Review of working of Information and Resource Centre
15 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
16 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
17 Review of progress of SHG formation
YEAR 3
Sr.
Activity
No.
1 Review of working of Information and Resource Centre
2 Capacity Building/Skill upgradation program for weavers
3 Workshops on Marketing
4 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
5 Capacity Building Workshop for Local designers
6 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
7 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
8 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
9 Updradation and addition of Looms
10 Participation in Trade Fairs
11 Review of progress of SHG formation
12 Review of working of Information and Resource Centre
13 Participation/Organising of Exhibition
14 Publicity campaign for Brand Equity of Chandur
15 Updradation and addition of Looms