NEDFi to promote various projects

Agartala, Sept 23: North Eastern Development Financial Institution (NEDFi) will help Tripura Government to promote various projects, including use of abandoned tea estates, to boost tea tourism or floriculture in the state, said its Chief Managing Director K.C Hazarika.

He also added that tea tourism could be developed in the state as a concerted tourism package. ''The experiment was carried out successfully by the Tata group in some of their abandoned tea gardens in Dibrugarh, Assam, which yielded huge benefits. This can be carried out in Tripura too,'' observed Mr. Hazarika.

He further added that NEDFi had prepared a detailed project report for the revival of the North East Regional Agricultural Marketing Cooperative (NERAMC) situated at Nalkata in North Tripura District. ''NERAMC will be turned into a multi products factory in order to make it profitable,'' said Mr. Hazarika.

The CMD added that NEDFi was making investments to boost the cottage based industrial units keeping in mind of the potentiality of the region. He also praised the women entrepreneurship for their contribution in creating job opportunities.

Mr. Hazarika termed the recovery rate as the bottleneck in arranging investment in the region, adding that the recovery rate in Tripura is just 11 per cent whereas it is 80 per cent in Meghalaya.

''The need of the hour is to develop good credit culture and capacity building among entrepreneurs to tap the full potentiality of the region,'' said Mr. Hazarika.

Meanwhile, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar has sought help from NEDFi for industrial development in the state.

Speaking at a programme organised by the NEDFi at Mohanpur yesterday, the Chief Minister said NEDFi and other nationalized banks should make sure that they provide financial help to the industrial entrepreneurs. ''The state Government has already decided to focus on some key sectors, including agricultural development, rubber based industries and fruit processing industries,'' he said.

Sarkar lamented the fact that NEDFi was giving more attention to Assam and Meghalaya compared to the other NE states.

UNI