In a bid to promote Indian products in a big way, the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCFH) has submitted final proposal to the Ministry of Textiles for setting up two large handicraft warehouses in Latin America and Russia. EPCFH is waiting for a positive response soon from Ministry of Textiles.

, Rakesh Kumar, Executive Director of EPCFH says they have proposed two handicraft warehouses: one in Uruguay in Latin America and Latvia in Russia. These will promote their products as these markets are potential in terms of business. Each warehouse will be built with an investment of Rs 100 crores. The idea is to help exporters who are currently facing several transport, credit and other related difficulties in the process of export and full circle transaction which normally stretches to a span of six months.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Textiles had built an export cluster with an investment of Rs 17 crores in AP to facilitate lace handicraft workers and exporters scale up to the growing demand for the products across the world.

The government is aiming at Rs 20,500 crores handicrafts exports for the current fiscal, over Rs. 2,000 crores more than the last fiscal. The government focused on southern region. For lace and crochet here, the target is pegged at Rs 500 crores exports in the coming five years. The current export is Rs 60 crores.