Hoping to revive its struggling tea industry, the Himachal Pradesh government has framed an action plan to double tea production in the state over the next five years.
In 2021-22, the state produced around 10 lakh kilogrammes of tea. “We plan to increase tea production to around 20 lakh kilogrammes over the next five years,” said agriculture minister Virender Kanwar.
Tea is cultivated over 2,310 hectares on the foothills of the Dhauladhar mountain range in Dharamshala, Shahpur, Nagrota Bagwan, Palampur, Jaisinghpur, Baijnath in Kangra district and Jogindernagar of Mandi.
“To expand the cultivable area under tea and raise its production, Chaudhary Sarwan Kumar Himachal Pradesh Agriculture University, Palampur, has planted 800 saplings at its agriculture research stations at Malan, Kangra, Bara, Barthin, Sundernagar, Bajaura and Dhaulakuan to explore the scope of tea cultivation in a non-traditional area. Orchard integration of tea is also being explored to offset area loss,” he said.
“An additional area of 5.6 hectares was brought under cultivation during 2021-22 and the government is hoping to expand it to 100 hectares over the next five years,” he said.
The tea industry contributed around ₹20 crore to the Himachal economy in the last financial year, providing direct and indirect employment to around 5,000 people.
{{/usCountry}}The tea industry contributed around ₹20 crore to the Himachal economy in the last financial year, providing direct and indirect employment to around 5,000 people.
{{/usCountry}}Kangra tea is mostly exported to foreign countries through the dealers at Kolkata.Only 10% of the tea is sold within the state, while 90% goes to an auction centre in Kolkata.
“Around 4,000kg of Kangra tea was exported to foreign countries, primarily Germany, the United Kingdom, Russia and France, in 2021-22, and we hope to increase exports to 20% of the production over the next five years,” said Kanwar.
Kangra Tea was sold at ₹160/kg at the Kolkata auction centre last year, while it fetched ₹400/kg in the domestic market. Around 5,900 families in the state depend on tea cultivation for their livelihood, and the average land holding of 95% of tea growers is less than 0.5 hectares. There are only 21 big tea planters whose average land holding is over 10 hectares, while around 237 of tea planters have average land holding between 1 to 10 hectares.
The agriculture department has provided one lakh tea plants, which will be planted in gardens and sold to growers at a nominal rate of ₹2 per plant. Farmers from the scheduled caste community can purchase the plants for a rupee.
“Tea planters will be given a 50% subsidy on machinery required for plucking and pruning, which will help manage labour shortage, one of the major problems faced by tea planters,” said Kanwar.
The minister said the agriculture department is also organising awareness training programmes in collaboration with the scientific fraternity to impart the latest technical know-how and to solve the problems being faced by the tea planters.
“We will also be organising tea festivals at popular tourist destinations such as Manali and Shimla over the upcoming to promote local tea products, “ he said, adding that the first tea fair was organised at Palampur in December 2021 and it drew a good response with over 400 tea growers participating in the event.