Ministries neglect plantation, says Jairam Ramesh

New Delhi, Jun 14 (UNI) India's plantation crops giving employment to five million people in six states remain utterly neglected, as neither the Commerce Ministry nor the Agriculture Ministry owns responsibility of nursing the crucial sector back to health, Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh said today.

''After four months in the job (as a minister), I have come to the conclusion that the organisation failure is the biggest bottleneck for the plantation sector'', Mr Ramesh said.

The MoS, handling the plantation sector in the Commerce Ministry, has proposed a full-fledged well-integrated Department for Plantations, be it in the Commerce Ministry or Agriculture Ministry.

''Let there be an integrated department taking care of this vital sector, which supports five million people in Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Assam and West Bengal'', Mr Ramesh said.

After hectic tours in all these states, the Minister of State in the Commerce Ministry, who does not even have a full-time joint secretary dealing with the plantation sector, has identified replantation as the most crying need for all the crops like tea, rubber, pepper and coffee.

With the help of various commodity boards, he has identified the requirement of Rs 470 crore as a Special Purpose Fund (SPF) for tea for replantation. Likewise, for rubber as much as 50,000 hectares need to be replanted at a cost of Rs 600 crore.

For pepper, the initiative would require Rs 400 crore and for coffee Rs 600 crore.

''All this money needs to be raised from the Centre, States and NABARD'', the minister said.

Another bottleneck area is the low level of productivity in the plantation sector resulting from no scientific research taking place due to poor working conditions and salary of the scientists employed by the research institutions of different commodity boards.

''I have mooted a proposal which has been approved by the Department of Personnel that the scientists in the commodity board research institutions should be treated at par with their peers in the laboratories in the CSIR and ICAR'', Mr Ramesh said.

He would soon take up the issue with the Finance Secretary for a fair deal to these scientists.

Marketing effort is yet another weak link in the plantation sector. While India is the largest producer and consumer, it holds no international tea fair. Now, with the effort of the Tea Board, an international tea festival will be held in Guwahati in March 2007. A coffee festival will be held in Bangalore in February next.

Mr Ramesh said the plantation sector has remained neglected because in the Commerce Ministry's scheme of things, exports from the plantation crops have been to the extent of only 1.5 billion dollar.

''In the total export basket of 100 billion dollar, it is hardly 1.5 per cent. So it does not matter in the overall scheme of things''.

The problems relating to the sector are often shuttled between the Ministries of Agriculture and Commerce with not much political support coming either, exepting from Kerala.

Mr Ramesh said it is in this context, that he wants a full-fledged department for the plantations.

''It may not be important from the point of view of dollar earning, but it provides employment to five million people. Besides, crops like pepper and cardamom face great threat from Sri Lankan imports and smuggling from Nepal.

Against the total production of 70,000 tonnes of pepper, as much as 15,000 is dumped duty free from Sri Lankan wrecking farmers in Kerala, Mr Ramesh said.

UNI PC CS VV1715