Our Hon’ble Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi’s initiatives in skill development to leverage the demographic dividend can be realized more impactfully if we look at recent global trends in leather industry. The churn in global trade resulting in higher duties for Chinese products and a strong dollar presents a great opportunity for Indian manufacturers. India can increase global market share provided we improve our productivity by filling in the skill gaps along with efficient planning and competitive pricing.

Many features of Industry 4.0 such as Automation, Robotics, IOT are fast transforming the nature of work, productivity and outcomes. To cope with this phenomenon, the industry has to proactively bring in latest technology and adopt smart manufacturing practices by evaluating the opportunity to be a global player.

They should also adopt lean principles of production with lesser working capital.  Workforce management with continuous re-skilling of the employees to perform higher skilled jobs on an automated line is another critical focus area.  Recently, the government and industry experts are of the view that the Shop Floor Supervisors are very important as they handle sizeable shop floor workers under them. We need to train them appropriately by developing Qualification Packs and orient them to industry’s best practices.