Agra's shoe manufacturers to get imported machines

After taking advantage of the Centre's schemes for technological advancements in the footwear manufacture by importing state-of-the-art automated shoe-production machines, the Central Footwear Technology Institute (CFTI) of Agra is now planning to make these machines available to footwear manufacturers and exporters of the town on a spare-capacity basis.

According to CFTI sources, the institute has recently procured an automated die-less cutting machine.

It is capable of drastically reducing labour costs involved in leather upper cutting, marking and numbering by finishing 1,500 man-hours' work in just 24 hours, with near 100 per cent accuracy.

Sources said the machine was capable of automatically deciding the utilisation of leather waste left after the cutting of shoe uppers from the sheet. It has been acquired to familiarise students at the institute with the latest technologies.

S N Ganguly, director, CFTI, said discussions in this regard were going on with a number of leather footwear exporters of Agra.