Textiles textiles have long been used in agriculture and fishing to protect, gather and store products. Today, modern materials and constructions have helped to increase the strength, lightness and durability of traditional products, as well as open up completely new markets.

Agriculture and fishing applications represent the sixth biggest market for technical textiles, although growth is relatively slow. This is partly because textile usage is dominated by yarn and monofilament products in relatively mature applications such as ropes, twine, and fishing nets and line. Another reason is that traditional materials are being replaced by products which have a lower textile content in terms of volume. However, the potential for growth is higher in materials for specialised applications such as equipment for fish farming and nonwovens for agriculture and horticulture.

Synthetic materials – especially polypropylene – have made considerable inroads into this market sector, although traditional materials remain significant where biodegradability is important. Also, modern textile materials have opened up possibilities for innovation in crop protection and shading, including floating covers, capillary nonwovens, and textiles incorporating fertilisers, pesticides, superabsorbent polymers and seeds.

This article comes from textilesintelligence edit released