Separate Plantation Ministry in brewing

SILIGURI: Government of India is proceeding towards formation of a new Ministry. At very preliminary stage of the whole process now, the policy makers are seriously contemplating the issues pertaining to need vs possibility, feasibility and utility to form a separate ministry to deal with Plantation crops like tea coffee, rubber or spice etc.

“If opinions from all sectors and stakeholders can bring in some consensus, Government will form a separate ministry for Plantation soon to give the sector a new regime of governance targeted towards better growth of plantation sector,” said Mr. S S Ahluwalia, BJP National Vice President and MP from Darjeeling.

While talking to ET on this he said, “Agriculture is a major economy builder in India with its contribution of around 13% into the GDP. But it is the largest employer sector. On the other side, Industry sector’s contribution is also very high at 21%. Now, there are certain special kind of field growing items like Tea, Coffee, Rubber etc those which are highly labour intensive and deeply attached to both agriculture as well as Industry sectors. Naturally these demand special treatment.”

There are separate boards to control, regulate or guide separate plantation items like Tea, Coffee, Rubber or spices. While many steps taken by these boards are largely appreciated, as usual, many of them are criticized too. Sometime complains do come about conflicts between policies made by different boards- these remained observation of many stakeholder sectors since long.

“Government is serious in giving true consideration to all these and to resolve the issues,” said Mr. Ahluwalia.

“With these as objectives, Union Commerce Ministry had a large scale meet with all stakeholders of tea sector on 13th October. This will be followed by similar exercise on items like Coffee, Rubber or spices. The process will continue to find out a final conclusion,” he added.