SPTF of Rs 4761 crores launched for rejuvination of tea industry

Kolkata, Jan 10 (UNI) Union Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh today announced the formal launching of the much-awaited "Special Purpose Tea Fund" of Rs 4761 crores for rejuvenating old tea gardens as well as the Indian tea industry as a whole with largescale re-plantation programme.

Briefing newsmen after a day long meeting with concerned officials, Mr Ramesh said four major issues were presently faced by the Indian tea industry whose overall production had taken a nosedive by about 25 to 30 per cent during the last few years causing a huge loss of foreign exchange to the national exchequer because of lesser exports.

"The SPTF would be usefully utilised for replantation of saplings in about 200,000 hectares of tea garden in different parts of the country during the course of next 15 years," he said.

Apart from launching massive replantation programme, the other issues faced by the industry were the problems of mandatory tea auction system and lack of proper marketing of Indian products, specially in the conventional overseas markers like Pakistan, Russia,UAE and the U.K.besides the emerging ones like Iran, Iraq and Egypt, the Union Minister felt.

He said "the 1600 odd tea gardens nationwide would start reaping benefits from the SPTF investment after at least five years when the saplings would be ready for production" and added that from then onwards the volume of Indian Tea production would be up by a whopping 35 to 50 per cent per annum bringing about a huge transformation in the sector which had been suffering from acute financial crisis for the past several years.

Elaborating the composition of Rs 4761 crore SPTF fund, which would benefit about 46 per cent tea gardens in Assam, 28 per cent gardens in West Bengal and 22 per cent those in Kerala and Tamil Nadu,besides some more in other parts of the country, Mr Ramesh said 25 per cent each of the total fund would come as central subsidiary and from the Tea garden owners, while the remaining 50 per cent would be generated as 'Soft Loans' from a conglomerate of various public sector banks having large exposure in the tea industry.

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