Govt plans new initiatives to address tea growers’ crisis

JALPAIGURI: Despite efforts of the Indian Tea Board and the government, the payment crisis haunting the small tea growers (STG) and the bought leaf factories (BLF) still remain largely unaddressed.

Under directives from the Union ministry of commerce and industry, the Indian Tea Board is in the process of forming a new directorate to address their crisis like Sri Lanka and Kenya.

Union minister of state for commerce & industry Jairam Ramesh on Sunday announced several other innovative schemes to address the crisis of the small growers, each growing tea in less than 25 acre of plantation.

Realisation of price of the green leave supplied by STGs to BLFs has been the bone of contention between the two groups in the tea manufacturing sector. BLFs always try to pull the price down on the question of quality of green leave to make it a distress sale for the STGs. Green leave cannot stay long after plucking. On their part, most STGs are reportedly not serious enough on the quality parameter.

In order to address the issue, Mr Ramesh said, “We are going to adopt the style followed by Sri lanka and Kenya and form five cooperative tea factories for the STGs only in north Bengal so that the STGs do not remain dependent on the BLFs.”

According to him, the Tea Board has already been directed to form a project report in this regard. After making an estimation of Rs 2 crore for the five factories Mr Ramesh said, “the government is ready to fund it.”

The government plans to send a delegation of STGs to Sri lanka and Kenya to get an overview of the STG operation and cooperative production facility there. In North Bengal, there are over 1000 STGs producing around 25% of the total green leave production. These generate huge employment, making the sector important for the rural socio-economy in the north Bengal districts.