For the coir industry to be globally competitive, it is essential to meet the customer demand for innovative products in the traditional coir export market through R&D efforts, says Board chairman Christy Fernandez. According to him, the priority research needs of coir industry include application research on varied use of coir geotextiles and diversification into composites using coir fibre and resins as wood substitutes, automobile components etc. Apart from these, development of machinery especially for spinning of coir yarn without using a central core, standardisation and quality improvement are also critical, he says.

The board has developed a technology for reducing the retting period and improving the quality of unretted brown fibre, in addition to developing a technology for converting the problematic coir pith into value added organic manure and a mushroom called `pith plus'. Both these technologies are patented and ready for transfer. It has also developed and successfully introduced low cost spinning machinery as well as fully automatic spinning and matting machinery, apart from several versions of traditional looms to reduce the drudgery of the labour engaged in the sector and increase productivity.

Development of a technology for production of a wood substitute, which is being commercially marketed under the trade name `Natura', is one of the major achievements. The board also worked for extraction of valuable chemicals like sodium and chrome ligno sulpahates (used in oil drilling and manufacture of dry cell batteries) from coir pith and in the development of paper out of coir bit fibres and fire retardant coir materials etc.

Despite all this, modernisation process in the coir industry has been very slow especially in the field of spinning and product manufacturing sector due to various socio-political factors. The apprehended threat of displacement of the labour as a result of mechanisation is a major reason attibuted to the slow process. Although a few fully mechanised units have come up for export purposes, the hand made coir products continue to be marketed at a premium price. Therefore, this sector cannot be ignored and requires to be developed for that particular niche in the market.

The Central Coir Research Institute, Alleppey, Kerala and Central Institute of Coir Technology, Bangalore are the two premier research organisations of the Coir Board who undertake R&D activities in collaboration with other research organisations in India and abroad for improving the process technologies, productivity etc. International co-operation is essential in the time-consuming and expensive exercises of development of new technology, new machinery and new products, said Mr Fernandez.

For a little market savvy!
As bulk of coir exporters are in the small and medium size, lack of market intelligence is a principle problem faced by them. Though coir products are exported to 72 countries across the globe, the industry needs a well-defined system for gathering market information to convert it into commercial intelligence. According to Mr Fernandez, the coir exporting countries should come together and form strategic alliances to enhance the growing awareness of the bio-degradability, eco-friendly and non-polluting products with concerted R&D and marketing efforts. They should jointly lobby their products in the face of severe competition from the synthetic product lobby, particularly in the geotextile area, he said. Today there is no globl forum to represent the cause of the coir industry and open up new markets.

There is a need to set up a coir database centre and conduct regular market study missions, he added. The high tariff rates ranging from 2 per cent to 30 per cent for coir in various importing countries is one of the hurdles for promoting coir and coir products. Also, non-tariff barriers including allegations of child labour, alleged use of hazardous chemicals, environment pollution while processing, restrictive banking facilities, import quota restrictions, anti-dumping measures etc are impeding the growth of coir exports.