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The global demand for textile products is rapidly increasing due to population growth, rising living standards, economic development, and fast fashion trends. Ethiopian growth and transformation plan (GTP) gives high priorities for the textile and apparel sectors to transform its agriculturally led economy to an industrial-based economy. To achieve this, the number of textile and apparel industries is rapidly expanding. However, the rapid growth in textile industry is generating mountains and mountains of by-products. In this review, possible applications of cotton stalk and cotton ginning waste in a variety of technologies and products are discussed in Ethiopian context. The finding of this study shows that Ethiopian current cotton cultivating area is about 80 000 hm2, even though the country has a potential of about 3 000 810 hm2 land for cotton cultivation. From the current cultivated area, more than 240 000 t of cotton stalk and 9240 t of cotton ginning trash have been generated as a by-product. But only a very little portion of the cotton stalk is being used as a raw fuel for household purposes and a small portion of cotton ginning trash is used for animal feed. Therefore, these underutilized lignocellulosic biomasses can be used as raw materials for producing different high-value biomaterials and thus country can perceive an economic and environmental benefit. A closer look at the structure and composition of the by-products shows that the whole part of cotton stalk and ginning waste can be used as a source of cellulose which can be exploited for conversion into a number of high-value biomaterials. Thus, conversion of the waste into valuable products can make cotton stalk and ginning by-products an attractive raw material for the production of high value bio-products.

The physical properties of wool fiber considered as vital attribute to grade, classify and select a raw wool fiber for different textile applications. Limited works have been done in Ethiopia to ad...

Ethiopia possesses about 30 million of sheep population which could be taken as a source of raw material for textile industries as a wise strategy to manage their natural fibers scarcity. This work explored the possible wool fiber potentials on selected sheep breeds. Three representative breeds as indigenous (Menz), exotic (Dorper) and crossbreed (50% Dorper/50% Menz) sheep breeds were considered to characterize the wool fiber properties. Samples have been taken from four main body parts for four age categories of each sheep breeds. All samples were allowed to standard laboratory conditioning before testing, and then, properties are measured based on ASTM. The results revealed that the fibers diameter and crimp frequencies of wool fiber of the three sheep breeds in Ethiopia are significantly different from each other. The crossbreeding of the Menz sheep with Dorper provides fine wool fiber. The wool fiber properties particularly the fineness and crimps of Menz, Dorper and 50% Dorper sheep of different parts and age categories are significantly different. Hence, these wool fibers shall be classified and graded based on their breeds to use for different applications, and also it could help to explore more on wool fiber production.

Development of smart textiles is an emerging discipline in the last two decades where a conductive element is integrated into a textile material by some means. The purpose of this research was to develop a conductive textile fabric by coating with charcoal as a conductive element. The charcoal was produced by carbonizing the eucalyptus wood at a temperature of 928 &deg, C for 37 min producing 59.17% w/w of fixed carbon yield and conductivity of 463.34 Sm&minus, 1 (Siemens per meter) compared to immeasurable conductivity of the wood. This was followed by characterization of physical and chemical properties of charcoal. Thereafter, a cotton fabric was pad-coated with a dispersion based on the charcoal. The paper herein reports the results of preparing different recipes using different quantities of charcoal particles with other components of the coating mixture, which was tested to obtain the best coating in terms of electrical conductivity. The optimal concentration of the conductive particles of the charcoal was studied. Performance evaluation of the coated fabric was assessed for the durability of fabric towards different fastness agents. The effect of charcoal loading on thermal and sensorial comfort of the fabric in addition to the air and water permeability was studied and a significant change was observed. Finally, a proof of concept was developed to demonstrate if the resulting pieces of information during the process were viable. As observed, the pad-coated cotton fabric using charcoal showed increased electrical conductivity from 1.58 &times, 10&minus, 12 Scm&minus, 1 (Siemens per centimeter) for the controlled sample to 124.49 Scm&minus, 1 for the coated sample designating that the resulting fabric is in a conductor category.

An attempt has been made to develop shrink resistance cotton textile by making it hydrophobic. The cotton fabric was made hydrophobic by treating with fluorocarbon resin emulsion at varying concentrations along with catalyst. The hydrophobicity was measured by carrying out water repellency test and also determining the water contact angle. The air permeability of cotton fabric was also determined and was not adversely affected. The untreated and treated cotton fabric was subjected to repeated domestic laundry condition and shrinkage was measured. In order to determine the impact of fluorocarbon treatment on fabric, the physical properties of treated and untreated cotton fabrics were compared. No adverse impact was observed in colour fastness properties. The tensile and tear strength showed good retention even at higher concentration of water repellent chemicals. This work finds wide use in home textiles and hotel industry. This work is of industrial interest as value added shrink resistance cotton textiles can fetch more export earnings.