ahmedabad fiona styraus a dutch national was recently on a trip to ahmedabad kutch was high on her mind after the earthquake made international headlines she inquired and was told about the culture tradition and crafts of kutch the exquisite kutchi apparel with their inimitable art mirror work embroidery and garments she decided to go for it she settled for a local boutique not having enough time to go to bhuj and packed herself with the inimitable chiburi suf work ahri and handmade batik pieces fiona carried with her to amsterdam embroidered cotton blouses and ghaghras long skirts without realising that all these fabrics and garments were sourced several thousands of kilometers away from kutch in china in fact says bimal mehta proprietor of pooja boutique a well known readymade garments shop in upmarket navrangpura i am getting traditional kutchi and gujarati garments from china which are much better than what i can find in gujarat at the same price yes kutchi prints made in china and available at a fourth of the cost to the wholesale buyer it is happening in amazing ahmedabad ashish christian who exports his jaishi brand of traditional fare says he participated in an international handicrafts trade fair in hong kong in july and instead of selling the one container of kutchi craft that he took from ahmedabad he ended up networking manufacturers from hunan and guangzhao to supply him replicas of gujarati handicraft samples that he left behind from exporter i have become an importer sourcing kutchi prints and jetpur bandhnis from hinterland china and exporting it to usa and canada he told tnn i dont know the economics and cost dynamics that the chinese work on but i know they are give a better bargain he says says mehta i will go on my 17th visit to china on thursday and this time i plan to get them to make rabari tanko and cross stich garments i am a patriot but then i am also a businessman and if this is globalisation then so be it according to mehta chinese manufacturers share the same cultural and traditional ethnicity as indians and they have fantastic market friendly not worker friendly labour laws so he adds they are able to give me a suf work or an ahri work at the fifth of the price that i get in kutch and such is the conveyor belt system in hunan yunan and quincho that they are able to deliver 500 sets of ghaghracholis of better quality in a week that kutch would take months to make they are far more efficient have a stringent noholdsbarred work ethic and a nononsence business mind mehta added several companies in china are available for sourcing of patolas baandhinis and chaniya cholis like shenzen friendship trading corporation shenzen zhaoquing metals importexport corporation guangdong china art tech corporation shenzen hunan yueyang company limited hunan beijing hualian international commercial company beijing fujian ruri trade importexport corporationfujian gino international trading shanghai