Tripura government will extend necessary assistance to private tea gardens of the state who are facing loss or having minimal productivity for their growth and profit. There are also initiatives to develop and promote Tea tourism in the state- one important step being setting up of a Tea Museum in Durgabari Tea estate in the outskirt of the city.
In Tripura after rubber tea industry happens to be an organised industry and as for production the state stands at 6th position in the country.
Presently the state has 54 tea gardens. Those are owned by the Tripura Tea Development Corporation, cooperative and private owners. There are also 2866 small tea growers in the state. Huge amount of green tea leaves is produced in these tea estates wherein 9,048 tea workers are employed.
Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb while reviewing the progress of Tripura Tea Promotion Board at the secretariat on Monday observed that although government-run tea gardens were moving towards profitable position, necessary assistance needed to be provided to the private tea estates. For this, the concerned department has been ordered to take necessary steps after knowing about the condition of private tea gardens from their owners.
The Chief Minister pointed out that there the demand for state-grown tea was growing and for that tea production also required to be augmented.
“Both government and private tea garden workers should be encouraged to increase production”, he said.
Chief Minister in the meeting emphasized setting an action plan to increase tea production.
He also suggested formation of a cooperative organisation with all those tea gardens that had been closed down in an attempt to rejuvenate them. Chief Minister expressed that in order to increase tea production in the state, private tea garden workers needed to be trained to be more skilled.
Director of industry and commerce T.K Chakma said, there are 24 tea processing units in the state. Among them three are run by government, five are cooperatives and 16 are under private ownership. Green tea is being made in three factories in the state. He said, Tripura tea logo was launched in 2018. Tripura Tea Development Corporation’s packaged tea was named as ‘Tripureswari Tea’ and is currently being sold in every ration shop in the state. Tripura Tea Development Corporation has set up a small Green Tea factory in Panchamnagar, Kailasahar. Besides there are already several initiatives afoot to develop and promote Tea tourism in the state—one of the important steps being setting up of a Tea Museum at Durgabari tea estate.
The Secretary of industry and commerce department Prashant Kumar Goyal in the review meeting said, TTPB was formed in 2009 to keep coordination with private tea gardens and for evaluation of tea industry.,
. Apart from this, plans are to set up ‘Tea Museum’ in Durgabari. Initiative has been taken to set up quality tourist spots in tea gardens to attract tourists and expand tea tourism.
In the review meeting director of industry and commerce briefed about all the measures taken on the basis of the decisions of the previous review meeting. Rejuvenation of tea gardens, infrastructural development, development of tea tourism, continuous power supply in tea factories, pipeline gas connection and steps to upgrade standard of living of tea workers were the important issues discussed in the meeting. Others present in the meeting were, TTDB Chairman Santosh Saha, RD secretary Soumya Gupta, secretary of revenue department Tanushree Debbarma and TTPB members.
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