Small scale industry ensures daily supply of micro-fibre for manufacturing of PPE

Kolkata: Small scale industry at Sankrail in Howrah is playing a crucial role during the COVID-19 pandemic by ensuring the daily supply of 50,000-metre micro-fibre that is needed to stitch personal protective equipment (PPE) for doctors and health workers.

The state MSME department is the nodal body to look after the production of the required number of PPEs and at present 20,000 pieces are being produced daily.

Sources in the department said that PPE is made out of a special type of micro-fibre and it is manufactured at only selective units. Two of such units are at Sankrail in Howrah those are meeting the demand of 50,000-metre everyday that is required to cater to the needs of PPE across the state.

"We are going to scale up the production of PPEs as two more stitching units in North 24-Parganas will become functional over the next two to three days. So the daily requirement of the micro-fibre will also go up," said a state government official, adding that they are in talks with five more units at Sankrail itself to increase the daily production of the raw material to 1 lakh metre.

Stitching of PPEs, gloves and masks is going on for the past 15 days at different units run by authorised vendors of different corporations and bodies under MSME department and each day 50,000-metre micro-fibre is distributed among the units, as per the requirement of each one.

Following directions of the state government, the workers at all the units are maintaining safe distance at their workplace.

The MSME department took up the step to produce PPE and other materials along with handwashing following directions of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. The state government is taking all steps to ensure the security of doctors, health workers and others who are fighting relentlessly to contain the COVID-19 outbreak and ensuring the supply of PPE is one of the crucial aspects of ensuring their safety.

Besides stitching 20,000 PPEs everyday, the MSME department has also produced 65,000-litre hand sanitiser, 5 lakh masks and 2 lakh green propylene masks.

At present, there is only one supplier of N95 masks and that too is in Delhi. So in a bid to become self reliant, the state government is also taking steps to ensure its production in Kolkata itself.