Monday, Feb 03, 2014
Alappuzha Kerala’s coir sector, which employs roughly 350,000 people across multiple districts in the state, has long been linked to one single product — the humble door mat. That image hasn’t helped in recent years in brand appeal and authorities in the state are now gearing up to give the sector a complete image makeover, with a variety of new products, mechanisation and fresh ideas in design.
At the Coir Kerala 2014 meet here in Kerala’s coir capital, delegates are exchanging notes on enhancing the utility of coir fibre, and taking it far beyond the traditional mats and matting product ranges.
“For any product to appeal to end users it must have an element of storytelling, an interactive narrative and keep in mind the global and local changes in consumer requirements”, says Sajith Gopinath, a faculty at the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad.
Gopinath says expertise across different areas need to be interlinked, and there has to be an outreach of the art of creation in coir products, taking it even to school students in order to enlarge the scope and marketability of coir products.
“For too long, coir has been identified with door mats. That image has to change. The coir sector needs to come up with exciting new designs to break the boredom and appeal to consumers”, says C K Peethambaran, a consultant to the National Coir Research and Marketing Institute.
Participants at the meet opined that given the rich traditional art and craft designs of the state and the rest of India, designers need not try to imitate the West for design elements and ideas.
Coir expert, C N Manoj said there was a pressing need to turn design ideas into real coir products, as well as ensuring that there was a focus on utility in design instead of solely focusing on the fancy aspect of designing.
India’s coir exports for 2011-12 was a shade over Rs10 billion, of which Kerala was the significant contributor with a share of 70 per cent.
By Akhel Mathew?Correspondent
Gulf News 2014. All rights reserved.
