Despite a contraction, the textile machinery industry quickened its step of restructuring in 2012. "The structural change is strong guarantee to the technological progress of the industry", said Wang Shutian, chairman of China Textile Machinery & Accessories Association at the board meeting recently held in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province.

The annual board meeting is an important platform for enterprises to get market information, discuss and map out future development plan. On the meeting, Gao Yong, Vice President of China National Textile and Apparel Council (CNTAC) analyzed the operation of textile economy in 2012 and forecast the developing trend in 2013.

CNTAC´s questionnaire to entrepreneurs shows that in the fourth quarter of 2012, the prosperity index of China´s textile industry is 58.61, showing sign of recovery. Gao Yong predicts that the export market will recover, but it is important for the Chinese textile and apparel industry to retain competitiveness on the world market; the demand on domestic market will increase further along with urbanization and rising income of residents; cotton price difference will remain a negative factor that will influence the operation of the cotton textile sector and the export of cotton-made products; the textile industry will operate steadily in an upward trend.

Wang Shutian pointed out that upgrading and restructuring remain the key task for the textile machinery industry in 2013. He said, although the economic operation of the industry showed a downward trend in 2012, the industry has quickened the step of restructuring. In 2013, enterprise merger such as the acquisition of Oelikon Textile Natural Fiber and Textile Components Business by the Chinese Jinsheng Group and enterprise transformation such as the case of Changzhou Tonghe Textile Machinery Manufacture Co., Ltd., a textile component producer who has recently involved in cotton textile machinery manufacturing will bring profound change to the structure of the textile machinery industry. A number of textile manufacturers such as Pacific Mechtronic (Group) Co., Ltd. and Tianmen Textile Machinery Co., Ltd. are moving from downtown to industrial parks. These enterprises will take this opportunity to step on a new stage. Moreover, the increasing foreign investment in the industry such as the inauguration of Rieter Changzhou Plant 2 and Oelikon´s new headquarters building in Shanghai indicates the restructuring campaign of the textile machinery industry has entered into a new period.

Wang Shutian also pointed out that the textile machinery should make greater efforts to exploring how to promote the technological innovation. As the largest textile machinery manufacturer in the world in terms of production scale and product variety, local textile machinery enterprises should become the leader of the industry instead of the follower. Therefore, his association is organizing member enterprises to establish innovation alliance, so as to enhance technological cooperation and promotion among enterprises. He said, the alliance will provide enterprises, universities and research institutions with a technological cooperation and promotion platform that is in line with market rules, so that they can work together to break technological bottleneck that handicap the development of the industry.

On the meeting, Lv Honggang, Vice Chairman of China Textile Machinery & Accessories Association was selected as Secretary General of the association, and Gu Ping and Chen Xingqiang were selected as vice chairmen.

Source: China Textile Leader