Region. Encouraging fresh ideas

Industry Minister, Kim Carr, is setting up a textile, clothing and footwear innovation network to encourage adoption of new ideas and practices an industry, which faces reduction to tariff protection from 10 per cent to 5 per cent in 2010. The textiles and clothing sector was the biggest loser in employment terms, in the decade to 2006, according to Professor Phillip O’Neill, of the Parramatta-based Urban Research Centre, in the University of Western Sydney. The region has had a long association with the industry dating back to the early days of the NSW colony, with textile manufacturers in Parramatta, Granville and Liverpool.