Financial Times

The North Carolina State University (NCSU) College of Textiles is to assist in upgrading Sri Lanka’s textile and apparel training facilities. This government funded venture is expected to support the apparel export trade by supplying the industry with specific skills that are currently either in short supply or are not available locally.

The NCSU College of Textiles is a leading academic and cutting edge research centre for textiles in the world. It is the largest textile college in the US, offering one of only two accredited Textile Engineering programs in the country and it produces over half the textile graduates in the US each year. The college’s research and collaboration activities with industries extend into the latest developments in textile, like intelligent textile, nanoscience initiatives, bio-medical textiles, automotive textile and environmentally sustainable textile. Over 150,000 people, says the College, have been implanted with a knitted polyester artery developed at their laboratories. North Carolina itself is a leading producer of textile for the US economy although the industry is now on the decline, with job losses taking place over the past 25 years to lower cost production centres in countries like Latin America and Asia. A partnership with NCSU’s College of Textile is considered the best way to leapfrog the technology and expertise gap between Sri Lanka and global leaders in the apparel trade, through its long-standing connections with the textile industry.

“The NCSU College of Textiles is supposed to be the best in the world for textile technology. North Carolina is in the textile belt of the US and the university is now diversifying into apparel and increasing industry linkages. So this collaboration with the university will help develop skill areas to meet (apparel) market needs,” said T G Ariyarathne, Acting Secretary General, Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF), the umbrella apparel industry body.

A team from the US University was in the island last month to study academic and training facilities already available and to decide how to structure a partnership with local training institutes.

“We have met buyers, suppliers and visited factories and training institutions,” said Dr William Oxenham, Associate Dean of Academic Programmes, NCSU, speaking at an apparel industry seminar regarding their visit, on Monday. “During all our meetings the same three issues were brought up. So we will be coming here for three things; supply chain management, industrial engineering and technical product development,” said Oxenham.

NCSU will impart these skills by collaborating with Sri Lankan education institutes. This will be done through teacher training programmes. The US University will develop the study programmes and study materials for the three identified areas and will also train a few local instructors who will visit NCSU to study these subjects. These instructors will, in turn, train local students. The American University says it has no plans to start an affiliate establishment in Sri Lanka but said it is considering issuing affiliate qualifications under the NCSU name, for Sri Lankan students following their programmes.

The three-year programme will be financed through the national budget. The 2006 budget allocated funding to set up an institute to train personnel for the apparel industry. The cost of the project was estimated at US$ 7.5 million over a three-year period and US$ 2.5 million (Rs 250 million) was allocated for 2006.

The JAAF says the allocated funding is adequate to improve education facilities available for the industry and is looking at speeding up the process by upgrading existing training institutes.

“We have identified some government institutes, a few vocational training institutes that give apparel related training and even a few private institutes that can be upgraded for the industry,” said Ariyarathne. These establishments include the Clothing Industry Training Institute, the Textile Training Services Centre and the Moratuwa University.