Common Facility Centres to come for promoting jute sales: Official

The textile ministry is in the process of building five jute Common Facility Centres (CFCs) worth Rs.10 crore across jute-producing areas in three states to promote sales, a senior official said on Tuesday.

"To start with, we are coming up with five jute CFCs and based on their performance, will plan other such centres as well," Textiles Secretary Sanjay Kumar Panda told media persons here during an event organised by the National Jute Board (NJB).

Union Textiles Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar on Tuesday laid the foundation stone of the new Patsan Bhavan which will house several offices of jute sector in an integrated office complex.

While West Bengal will get three such CFCs in Nadia, North 24 Parganas and Hoogly districts, Assam and Bihar will get one each at Barpeta and Katihar districts respectively.

Intended to train the workforce - namely women self-help groups - in modern uses of jute besides the traditional items, each of these centres will have an office with internet connectivity, warehouse for stocking raw materials and finished products, a work processing unit to handle large volume of orders and a hospitality unit to house visiting designers, customers and others. The estimated investment in these processes is to the tune of Rs.500,000.

"The total investment in each of these CFCs will be Rs.2 crore which will also involve various stipends and other monetary benefits payable to the jute workers upon completion of training," said Panda.

He said it needs a 60 by 60 feet plot from the state government to build these centres.

The NJB has also signed an agreement with the National Institute of Design to help these centres with "market-worthy designs".

"We'll ask those companies involved in marketing of jute products to adopt one of these clusters. These companies, hence will not only be designing the products themselves, but making them as well as selling them to the end-user directly," the official said.

Panda added the textiles department is also chalking out a way to rescue the sick companies in the jute sector.