Indian Handicrafts & Gifts Fair 2011- EPCH-Press brief by Raj Kumar Malhotra and Rakesh Kumar

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The 31st edition of Asia's largest Indian Handicrafts and Gifts Fair (IHGF-Spring) will begin at India Expo Centre & Mart at Greater Noida Expressway in the NCR of Delhi from February 19, 2011, in which more than 2300 exhibitors from all over the country will be showcasing a wide range of eco-friendly products and over 6500 foreign buyers from 31 countries, in addition to 350 foreign buying agents based in India, are expected to visit the mega fair to source their requirements. The prestigious four-day b2b event, being organized by the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH), will mainly focus on eco-friendly products made out of different raw material base like wood, metal, cane and bamboo, textiles made of natural fibres, wool, silk, jute, coir, stone, leather, terracotta, lacquer and using vegetable dyes. Over 900 product lines, styles and designs will be on display. "The IHGF over a period of 16 years, since its inception in 1994, has made yeoman contribution to the Handicrafts trade from India. It has not only enabled Indian exporters in large numbers to participate in the show and secure orders but it also enabled more and more foreign buyers to source their requirement from India at one place one time from the entire exporting Indian community. The most important role played by the IHGF has been the increase in the foreign exchange earnings", stated Mr. Raj Kumar Malhotra, Chairman of the Council. The fair is organized two times a year viz. February and October, known as Spring and Autumn Fairs respectively, and has acquired the reputation of ''One Stop Sourcing Event'' amongst the overseas buying community and 'most effective marketing medium' amongst Indian exporting community. Despite the fact that USA and Europe have been major buyers of India, the focus of EPCH is now on new emerging markets hitherto unexplored and under-explored regions like Latin America, Central Asia (CIS), Africa and South East Asia for promoting overseas business visitorship to this handicrafts and gifts fair, Mr. Malhotra added. For this fair, buyers and journalists from countries of Central Asia, Latin America, Africa and ASEAN regions will be visiting the Handicrafts & Gifts Fair to see the range and quality of products on display and carry back stories to be published in the subsequent issues. In addition to overseas buyers, representatives of buying houses, buying agents, importers and wholesalers from America and Europe will also be visiting the fair. "The uniqueness of IHGF is that unlike other fairs held in the various parts of the world, this fair has only Indian participation for display with foreign buyers from developed and developing Nations visiting and seeking supplies of wide and varied range of products from India to cater to all segments of consumers in their country. The speciality of this fair is that products on display are of all varieties and qualities suiting to the different segments of the consumers viz. from low end, middle end to top end consumers", said Mr. Rakesh Kumar, Executive Director, EPCH. Another uniqueness of this fair is that by and large, the products on display are hand crafted and hand made and machines are used only for finishing purposes. Perhaps, this is the reason that India does not cater to buyers seeking supplies of one typical product in thousand and millions. India still has the distinction of exclusivity in terms of each product, each design, colours and raw material base. The products on display are ecologically friendly as most of the raw material used is natural and not chemically made and the dyes and colours used are also vegetable dyes rather than chemical dyes, Mr. Rakesh Kumar added. Handicrafts exports witnessed a 19.81 per cent growth at Rs 6633.15 crore during the first nine months of the current financial year 2010-11 as against Rs 5536.28 crore during the same period in 2009-10. Indian manufacturers and exporters of handicrafts and gifts items from all parts of India will display best of their latest and innovative products under one roof spread over 97,000 square metres at the world class mart which also houses 900 permanent showrooms. The fair is expected to generate sizeable enquiries and business orders for the Indian handicrafts sector. EPCH is the nodal export promotion body for handicrafts in India under the aegis of Ministry of Textiles, Govt. of India.For more …http://www.parichowk.com/epch.aspx