The Hindu Business Line : Tea Board to seek Centre's help for re-planting

THE Tea Board Chairman, Mr N.K. Das, has stressed the need for examining the possibility of re-engineering the tea industry to make it globally competitive.

Stating that these issues would be addressed in the stakeholders' conference slated for September 16 and 17 at New Delhi, Mr Das, while inviting UPASI representatives to this conference, said the existing policy and legislations/ regulations required for facilitating sustainable growth had to be looked into.

"There is an urgent need to go ahead with a massive re-plantation programme. It would be a 15-year-long programme, covering an area of 2.12 lakh hectares and involving an investment of Rs 4,761 crore," he said.

The Chairman, while assuring the planters that he would try to get some low cost funds for such efforts at replanting and rejuvenation of tea bushes, said that the board would seek the Centre's help for getting a sum of Rs 1,000 crore towards the corpus.

Lamenting on the steep decline in orthodox tea production in South India, which has slipped from 94 per cent in the 60s to 16 per cent in 2003, Mr Das said he hoped some subsidy would be announced this year.

The Rubber Board Chairman, Mr S. M. Desalphine, while expressing apprehension about the downward movement in price levels since August 2004, said the drop though was only marginal, not steep.

The futures market has been active in the last two years, he said and added that it had to a certain extent influenced the spot market.

The Spices Board Chairman, Mr C.J. Jose, expressed confidence of surpassing the production target by 40 per cent, both in quantity and value. He said vanilla was the focus, and the area expansion was targeted at 15,000 hectares by 2007. Of this, 5,000 hectares would be supported by the Spices Board.

He said the board was awaiting the Government approcal for a proposal to promote intense spices plants for the premium market.

Mr Jose hinted that the board would, in two months , come out with a plan for direct marketing of cardamom, vanilla and pepper, by joining hands with a company in Bangalore.