Prime Minister Ibrahim Mehleb said the government has decided to give full support to textile workers to revive the industry, adding that important decisions were made to develop the industry. Daily News Egypt received a statement of Mehleb's meeting on Tuesday discussing the issues of the textile industry, while creating a map for its development. The meeting was held in the presence of the Minister of Industry and Foreign Trade Mounir Fakhry Abdel Nour, the chairman of the Cotton and Textile Industries Holding Company, chairman of the Egyptian Chamber of Textile Industries, and chairman of General Union of Textile Workers. Mehleb demanded that two urgent meetings be set, the first including the ministers of industry and agriculture and officials of the Egyptian Chamber of Textile Industries. In this meeting, they will agree on a policy for cotton cultivation. The second meeting will decide on a road map to develop the textile industry into a national project. This followed a conference that was held earlier this week, in which these recommendations were added. The textile industry is going through several crises, including the absence of a clear policy to cultivate cotton and the low liquidity in factories. There are also issues faced from customs smuggling, which is a threat to the local industry. The government is exerting efforts to improve the industry and lower the rate of losses in its treasury. In the opening of a Sunday conference on "a roadmap to save the textile industry", Minister of Manpower Nahed Al-Ashry confirmed the importance of solving the textile industry's issues in order to maintain it. Al-Ashry said Mehleb has formed a committee of several ministers to discuss the industry's problems. According to Minister of Finance Ashraf Salman, the government is currently conducting consultations with consultants specialised in this industry, to develop an investment plan timetable. The return on investment will be the basis for commencing the technical restructuring of companies. It is expected, according to the investment minister's recent remarks, that the study will be completed in early 2015. It is aimed to improve the situation of companies and to face the losses that hinder their growth, providing new plans for the industry's development. A source from the Holding Company for Spinning and Weaving, affiliated to the Ministry of Investment and followed by more than 20 subsidiaries, said that managing the company's urgent obligations is the most important undertaking. These include wages and salaries, annual bonuses and the provision of raw materials. The source added that these are its most important obligations towards its subsidiaries to increase productivity, improve quality, develop sales, reduce the deficit and assure the continuation of the production process all production sites.
