R & D Schemes To Enhance Tea Quality Planned

The Tea Board is contemplating the launch of a number of schemes related to research and development (R&D) which would go a long way in enhancing quality of various Indian teas.

The boards move comes close on the heals of the union commerce ministrys decision to increase funds towards tea research.

A research advisory committee (RAC) organised by the National Tea Research Foundation (NTRF) met in Calcutta yesterday to deliberate on various ongoing research projects related to plant pathology, microbal controls of pest diseases and the nature of residual toxicity on tea.

The meeting was presided over by the Tea Board chairman S S Ahuja and attended by A K Sarma of Tea Research Association (TRA), B C Borbora, director, TRA, N Muralidharan of Upasi, and K P Agarwal of Nabard and P C Chaudhuri, director (research), Tea Board besides noted scientists V L Chopra and K K G Menon.

 

At present, the schemes have been launched from the NTRF fund raised by the tea producers for promoting research. The programmes are primarily undertaken by various research institutions including Tea Research Association, Upasi, the Himachal Pradesh Krishi Viswavidyalaya among others.

The corpus of the NTRF is around Rs 10 crore of which nearly one third is funded by Nabard while the rest is being pooled by the Tea Board and tea producers. The funds are accrued on the basis of bank interests which are ploughed back for funding the research related activities.

The decision of the board to set aside funds for research this year stems from the fact that the ministry will be able to raise additional funds through an enhanced tea cess this year.

Recently, the tea cess was raised from 15 paise to 30 paise for estates other than those in Darjeeling, where it had been raised from 8 paise to 12 paise.

Apart from deliberating the ongoing schemes, the Calcutta meet discussed a host of new schemes related to heterotropic nitrifires from tea to raise the plant and soil health, isolation and different issues of antotoxidants from tea leaves, microbal control of pest diseases and weeds of tea in north-east India, specified residues and metabolism in Himalayan tea, the role of enzyme in tea processing and the groundwater status of tea soils of Assam and its impact on leaching and fertilizer management through remote sensing techniques.