EHKİB President Burak Sertbaş informed that 26 billion of Turkey’s 168 billion dollars of exports in 2018, was made by the ready-to-wear and textile industries, and called on young people to choose Textile Engineering in their university preferences saying “There is a Future in Textile”.
In order to encourage young people to become textile engineers, the project “Improving the Perception of Textile Engineering” was launched in cooperation with the Aegean Ready-to-wear and Apparel Exporters’ Association (EHKİB) and the Aegean Textile and Raw Materials Association (ETHB). The event, supported by İzmir Provincial Directorate of National Education, was held with the ‘Adding Value’ presentation to the guidance counselors in İzmir by educator/writer Ahmet Şerif İzgören.
Speaking at the launch, EHKİB President Burak Sertbaş emphasized that 26 billion of Turkey’s 168 billion dollars of exports in 2018, was made by the ready-to-wear and textile industries. Turkey’s textile and apparel exports in 2018 was 26 billion dollars, while imports remained at 9.2 billion dollars, Sertbaş said; “We give a surplus of 17 billion dollars in foreign trade balance. While the export unit price of the automotive industry was 7 dollars/kg, the export unit price of our textile and apparel industry was 14.4 dollars/kg. We can easily say that this is a ‘high value added’ industry, our export unit pricing is pretty much above the average of Turkey. When we include all value chains of our industry, we employ about 2 million people”.
Textile engineering is the job of the future
Burak Sertbaş said that ready-to-wear and apparel companies will need qualified textile engineers in the coming years and that they have implemented the “Upgrading the Perception of Textile Engineering” project to respond to this need. Arguing that the perception of engineering is worsening in Turkey, Sertbaş has continued as follows; “Young people don’t prefer engineering. The situation is not different in textile engineering. There is a serious supply and demand shortage in textile and apparel industries. For this reason, in line with the demands from the industry, we would like to ensure that the ‘Textile Engineering’ departments of the Engineering Faculties are preferred by the students in the coming years. We aim to win the foreign language based students to the ‘Textile Engineering’ team.”
İzmir National Education Director Ömer Yahşi stated in his speech that they saw the advantages presented by the Aegean Exporters Union to whom prefer the Textile Engineering Department with the project and thus decided to cooperate. Touching on the importance of teachers, Yahşi said; “We will have beautiful dreams for the future when 850 thousand students in İzmir have a beautiful profession. We care about all our students. We are working on professional development academy for our teachers to improve themselves. So far, 40 thousand teachers have participated voluntarily”.
There is a Future in Textile: a very fashionable invitation
Elvan Ünlütürk, the chairman of EHKİB Educational Institutions and Industry Cooperation Committee; who started her words by saying; “Meet a very fashionable preference” said that textile engineers transformed dreams into textile in the industry; and acted as a bridge between design and production. “Textile engineers do not tailor; but contribute to the formation of the final product with design-oriented products,” said Ünlütürk; “We’re spinning away the raw materials; then we develop fabrics, then we are producing clothes from these fabrics and sell to chain stores. The export of apparel industry steadily increased and reached 17.5 billion dollars. Turkey needs Textile engineers affluent in a foreign language. The risk of the unemployment is very low. The working conditions are high, they have a universal value. An industry that provides added value and provides employment. There will be a future in textile”.
Educator/writer Ahmet Şerif İzgören provided the “Adding Value” training to guidance counselors and education managers in İzmir. İzgören said that to be successful in business life; “Labor, knowledge and work ethics are required. Try to make the children want to do the work they want to do, give children the opportunity”.