Report

Wool, long regarded as a symbol of New Zealand’s pastoral heritage and a sustainable alternative in an increasingly eco-conscious world, is set to take centre stage again, as it gets knitted into a government directive mandating the use of Kiwi-grown and manufactured wool carpets in public sector buildings.

This is not the first time that India has found itself with a heaven-sent opportunity. This time, however, all indicators are that the ground situation is different. Will India be able to upstage China in the global textiles and apparel trade? A ground report.

Observers are agog over how the launch of a pilot qcom programme by leading e-commerce player, Myntra, will play out. Speculation is rife about what this will mean for fashion markets in India. The talk is mostly about brands and big players. What do these mean for small manufacturers? Do they get new platforms to sell? Or, does this mean they will get financially squeezed as they are often on e-comm marketplaces? An analysis.

Does Denmark’s tax on livestock carbon emissions, to run effective from 2030, make scientific sense? Will it help the environmental, human health or farming livelihoods? Will the move impact the leather industry outside of Denmark? texfash probes.

Border posts remain clogged, orders and payments are stuck, and amidst all there’s also a lot of talk that the political upheaval in neighbouring Bangladesh could see shifting of orders to India. But, till government tweaks some policies, Indian apparel manufacturers making hay from the Bangla crisis appears wishful thinking.

It is not just an irony, but an outright travesty that this needs to be emphasised: the second-hand clothing sector does indeed generate jobs in a region where millions live below the International Poverty Line of $2.15 a day. A study that looked at SHC in Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia explored a facet that anti-waste activists unfortunately choose to ignore.

The death-knell of Somerset-based leather manufacturer, Pittards had been sounded much earlier but when it finally closed shop last September, the story of a worldwide brand known for producing gloves for the Royal Family, is one that has lessons for entrepreneurs of all hues.

As canvassing reaches a quiet crescendo with low-key street campaigns and public meetings in Mizoram, it does so under the watchful eyes of the Presbyterian Church and civil society organisations united under the umbrella Mizoram People’s Forum (MPF) that gets all political parties to sign an agreement every election to follow a code of conduct, perhaps more stringent than even that of the Election Commission. Five key stakeholders are fighting it out, with a new entrant in the form of the Aam...

Mizoram goes to the hustings on November 7 and as one criss-crossed part of the state last week, the usual poll-hungama of rallies, buntings, cut-outs of political leaders on highways, the countryside or in the two main towns, door-to-door canvassing, was conspicuously amiss. Instead, a group of party workers would point you to a make-shift stall or hall for some tea and snacks. It is not because they are laidback. Anything but that! Talk to people from across segments of society and the...

When the party ends before it begins and crushes in its wake a hundred dreams—this is what happened to the Tlawng Festival that was scheduled at Lunglei on 13–14 October. A venue where, the organisers claimed, no other event has had to take permission, the authorities-that-be cited November 2022’s National Green Tribunal order to cancel the festival. “The District Park has always been open for the people. There were no permissions required. We would have paid the money for using the grounds...