Automation Can Bring About A Boom In The Handicraft Industry: Pankaj Bhandari, MD, Smart Creations
Handicraft is fragmented and a small scale industry, with more than seven million regional artisans and more than 67,000 exporters/export houses promoting regional art and craftsmanship in the domestic and global markets. The industry is one the major generator of employment thus it has the economic advantage in India, but is going through a lot of challenges currently.
Pankaj Bhandari, MD, Smart Creations told BW Businessworld, “Automation can be a big boom to this sector. Company with the new, creative and unique idea will survive in this industry. More jobs can be created in automation and handicrafts by creating a good integration. Common technology in designing in Cad, 3-d printing, rubber moulding, and larger furnaces need to be used by more people so that skilled workers do what they are best at. There are challenging times ahead, but where there is change there is always opportunity.”
However, new opportunities are getting shifted to countries like China and more than 30 different groups are looking at idols to be made in China. Indian iconography is a well-developed subject, which is not yet matched by machines.
Lack of Funding is a major issue in the industry. Most of the Handicraft industry depends on the raw material supply which suffers greatly from lack of working capital and access to credit and loan facilities.
Not much of data is available on the typical size of Handicraft Company. There are large companies, in brass at Moradabad and Aligarh. Most of the quality and large productions are exported. Major business comes from unregistered dealers. There are many Artisan's which are continuing the traditional arts since generations, but the youth are not coming into the industry.
A role change can be expected in the coming days, with more of younger and smaller artisans working in clusters, under bigger artisans, with proper payments made to them in time.
There aren’t enough schools to teach skilled labour in bronze handicrafts. Women need to be encouraged to be trained in this art form. The training schools would be needed in a way which can train both men and women.
Bhandari added, “The lack of market understanding by customers’ results into buying the copied product rather than original one. There is no proper professional Institute for the formal approach towards this industry. There is no patent and no copy right on the art so it is easily being copied by different centres.”
India is renowned for its Handicraft industry, which is a very old art and is passed generation to generation. The Government of India has also focused on these art forms which can be seen through various handicraft exhibitions promoted both nationally and internationally. Skill development industry is investing in some artisans who are training younger generation, which can bring about a major overhaul in the sector.
