Renowned Italian mosaic designer Giulio Vinaccia on Monday delivered a lecture and imparted practical training to women on 3D at the marble mosaic workshop arranged for women by the Pakistan Stone Development Company (PASDEC).
PASDEC has launched marble mosaic and inlays training session to promote skill development and entrepreneurship culture amongst women. The program will generate opportunities of livelihood in remote and rural areas at economical cost of production. Mosaic is an art of decoration with small pieces of stone and renowned not only for its design and aesthetic beauty but also skillfulness of handiwork because each product is made by intricate handwork.
Giulio Vinaccia also called on Chief Executive Officer Ihsanullah Khan and discussed 3D usage in mosaic designing. He highlighted the importance of 3D designing in marble mosaic making. He told that the use of 3D designing in mosaic can increase the value of the product.
Pakistan has more than 100 types of natural stones in different colours, vein-age and shades, which exist from Karachi to Siachen glacier. Approximately 297 billion tonnes of marble and granite reserves have been explored in Pakistan while a huge amount is yet to be identified. Besides having immense reserves and a variety of marble and granite, the country’s share in the world exports quantum is only 0.096 per cent, as compared to China’s share of 17.8 per cent and India’s 5.7 per cent.
The marble exports have increased from $47.2 million to $59.7 million in the fiscal year 2009-10. The target of marble exports has been set at $76 million the current fiscal year. While the government plans to increase the export earnings to over $100 million within three years due to introduction of mechanised quarrying in the country. The reason for low exports was the orthodox mining practices, including indiscriminate blasting and lack of modern extraction technology. PASDEC is repositioning the sector by setting up 10 model quarries, 20 quarry upgradations, 2 machinery pools, 4 common facility training centres and 7 marble industrial estates.
