Srinagar: Director Handicrafts J&K, Mehmood Ahmad Shah, called for a fine balance between the survival of the Pashmina goat and that of the craft and livelihood of craftsmen, underlining that it would be a “great loss” if we “lose these skill sets”.
The official was speaking at the Stakeholder Consultation Workshop on Pashmina which was held at the University of Kashmir on Monday.
The day-long workshop titled ‘Developing Technologies for Diagnosing Impurities in Fibre Used in Pashmina Shawl Weaving Industry’ was organised by the varsity’s Centre of Research for Development (CORD) in collaboration with CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), one of the country’s premier research organisations working under the Union Ministry of Science and Technology.
In his introductory remarks, Dr Karthikeyan Vasudevan, Chief Scientist CSIR-CCMB, said the current workshop is part of a priority project for CSIR that aims to engage with the region of Jammu and Kashmir on different issues that confront its biodiversity conservation, an important aspect of which is the Pashmina shawl weaving.
