Cheap labour cost makes Indian textile mills turn to Ethiopia

The reason? Ethiopia offers ready-to-use sheds, income tax breaks, training subsidies, and a tax-free gateway into the US, Europe and China

KPR Mills, one of the major textile mills from Tirupur, Tamil Nadu, has started a unit in Ethiopia to take advantage of lower labour cost, duty savings, and shorter shipment time to the US and European markets. 

KPR joins the list of other prominent peers such as Raymond, Arvind, Best Corporation and Jay Jay Mills. All these companies feel it will be difficult to take on the competition from Bangladesh, Cambodia and others, with their made-in-India products. So, they hope their Africa investments would bring a new wave of growth. 

KPR has invested Rs 25 crore for a capacity of 10 million