They said if the government provides 80 percent capital grant, they are ready to invest the rest 20 percent capital needed for setting up tea factories.[break]
The Tea Producers’ Cooperative organization, Ilam, demanded the grant submitting a memorandum to Minister for Agriculture and Cooperatives Mrigendra Kumar Singh Yadav who is on a trip to eastern Nepal including Ilam this week.
The government had declared to provide 80 percent loan, and 25 percent grant for the construction of the tea factories through the budget speech. However, it was not implemented.
Around 25,000 farmers are forced to take green tea leaves to Jhapa district and various industries in India as they do not have tea processing plants in Ilam. “Besides, the factories do not give proper price to our produce,” said chairman of the organization Krishna Subedi.
Ilam produces around 100 tons of tea leaves daily in the main season.
“We requested the government for support as the farmers could not afford money to establish factories on our own,” said Subedi.
There are 12 private tea processing plants and three of them are run by Nepal Tea Corporation.
Encouraged by the government’s announcement in the budget speech, the farmers had even purchased 10 ropanis of land to set up a factory. But their dreams did not materialize as the government did not provide the promised loan and grant.
“The government did not support us even though we visited the ministry time and again,” said Subedi. “The land we purchased for the factory has also remained useless,” he said.
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