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At a meeting of small tea growers recently, a section of growers from Assam sought the Tea Board Chairman’s help in acquiring some mechanised boats for ferrying green leaf across the Brahmaputra River. These growers are from Sadiya, on the northern bank of the river, where there is no tea processing unit. As a result, the tea grown in the small tea gardens there needs to be transported by country boats to processing units located on the other side of the river — ; a primitive system of transportation, entailing time and cost. To start with, at least two mechanised boats are needed for faster movement, said the growers. Never before, as the Tea Board Chairman observed, has there been any such request to the Board. While the Tea Board, it was indicated, would consider the demand sympathetically, it was not sure if it would be in a position to fund the entire cost of acquisition of such vessels, estimated at Rs 8-10 lakh each. Does the cargo inducement justify such investments? Right now, a few thousand kilograms of green leaf are ferried everyday, but once the mechanised transportation facility is in place, small tea growers from Arunachal Pradesh too are expected to come forward to make use of it, it was pointed out.

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