Textile production

4.1. Introduction
Innovation is vital for the sustainable development of all sectors of human society. The textile industry can be credited with continuous innovation throughout its 350 year history as a global industry. It was innovation in the textile industry that initiated the industrial revolution. As this example shows, innovations in the value chain of textile production have had an immense impact on global welfare and trade. Today the textile industry in many developed countries faces great challenges in maintaining its position, and the industry is eagerly looking for new, innovative ideas and approaches to find future technologies, products and markets. The main theme of this chapter is to discuss the process of innovation for the sustainable growth of the textile industry.
The textile industry is a typical industrial sector representing a global flow of capital, materials, chemicals, processing machinery, finished products and ideas. In recent times, as with other industries, the impact of globalization on the textile and clothing industry has been huge, resulting in dynamic regional trade flows within the EU, Asia–EU, Asia–N. America, N. America–S. America. In many developed countries worldwide, this has resulted in the redefining of companies’ strategies in terms of getting into new market areas and re-engineering a companies’ production marketing philosophy, and has accelerated the manufacturing of added value products instead of commodities. The textile industry in the developed world is, therefore, focusing on enhancing its capability to produce and market high quality and added value products with an emphasis on new technology, design, marketing and management. A key area of such growth has been technical textiles.
Innovations are based on the results of research in application-oriented and problem-focused projects, with the aim of improving products and processes for the market. Innovations are typically the results of targeted efforts by entrepreneurs in the work place. Within the textile industry, invaluable contributions are made annually by many stakeholders in the supply chain. Innovation-driven research in textiles has, in the past, come from the R&D laboratories of medium and large textile companies, in-line and on-line quality control systems suppliers, fibre producers, machinery and component manufacturers and the suppliers of dyes and other chemicals or treatments for textile finishing. These innovations are then marketed to other textile companies, including the very large percentage of textile SMEs who cannot fund their own research. Outputs are judged not only by the number of patents, but also by the extent and type of technology transfer, business performance, profit and, finally, economic growth.
Historically, the academic textile research laboratories concentrated most on publishing scientific papers or carrying out testing and non-competitive research activities such as drafting of standards. Textile research institutes have, thus, made invaluable contributions in such areas as developing national and international standards and carrying out research work in such areas as the environmental issues facing the textile industry. It is estimated that, today, billions of US dollars are spent worldwide in government-funded research projects at universities and academic institutions, resulting in a huge number of research papers being published annually in the field of textiles and clothing. However, much of this academic research is not innovation-driven and consequently we see a relatively small number of innovative products appearing in the textile industry as a result of these projects. To my knowledge, there are very few examples of major innovations which can be referred solely to academic sources. In the area of fibre innovation, Prof. G. Nattas’s work on polypropylene is one of these. The subject of innovation is still often absent from the educational and scientific programmers of many universities and research establishments around the world.