Musiad organized a summit for textile and leather industries in Izmir where Suleyman Orackcioglu of Orka group, fashion designer Arzu Kaprol and Prof. Dr. Ziynet Ondogan of Ege University Engineering Faculty participated with their presentations
In his opening speech Musiad Izmir branch chairman Umit Ulku said, “Textile sector is one of the major industries in national development. It is the first industry that industrialization has begun. Textile industries in Turkey have a 22.6% share in total exports and employ about two million.” He also expressed his happiness about his observations during his visits in foreign countries where Turkish brands have been regarded as high quality.
Ahmet Yazici, chairman of textile and leather industries group of Musiad told about the objectives of Musiad as supporting and helping to find solutions to problems of member companies in their efforts to expand their business. He said, “We have been organizing several summits in related cities annually. This time we are in Izmir, a leading city in the production of fancy apparels, value added textile products, leader in the production of wedding gowns in the region, having about 1200 companies in the sector, the pearl of Aegean.”
In the panel held in the summit, the first speaker was world famous fashion designer Arzu Kaprol she said, “Believing the importance of this summit, I came here immediately from Paris Fashion Fair. The story began with having right products. Demand for design has been increased enormously during the last 15 to 20 years. Many of us have become world class brands, designers and producers. It seemed that it will keep going further. Design is to develop a complete concept. In line with trends in fashion field, we have to develop sustainable design chains. Design process is not only confined to products itself, it also covers other stages of marketing chain, including development of concept and design, production of end product, its exhibition in retail shops.”
Ziynet Ondogan, Prof. of Aegean University, Textile department, told about sustainable quality. She said, “First target market has to be determined, collections should be developed and prepared, production process must be planned, production processes should be supported by suitable quality management methods.”
Last speaker in the event was Suleyman Orakoglu, Orka group chairman. He summarized the developments in the industry since 2001, and said that, the industry has surpassed total exports of Greece with its textile and apparel exports.
He said, “By now we have been talking about the greatness of our data about production, sales, employment ind growth. During that period, textiles and apparel industries have always been at top. Now we began to talk about these two fields as one integrated industry. It covers all aspects including design, production and marketing. On every phase we have had great companies, brands and players.
In 2001 Turkey’s total exports was about 24 billion dollars. This year textile and apparel industries will export about 28-29 billion dollars worth of products, 9-9.5 billion dollars of it belongs to textile, 19-19.5 billion dollars of it belongs to apparel industry.”
