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Coffee replantation scheme gets Rs. 310 crore package

— PHOTO: V. SREENIVASA MURTHY

FRESH FLAVOUR: Union Minister of State for Commerce, Jairam Ramesh (right), addressing a press conference in Bangalore on Saturday. Coffee Board Chairman, G. V. Krishna Rau, looks on.

BANGALORE: Union Minister of State for Commerce, Jairam Ramesh, on Saturday said that the Union Cabinet had approved the development support scheme for coffee replantation and other works aimed at rejuvenating coffee cultivation during the XI Plan.

Speaking to reporters, he said the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs had approved a Rs. 310 crore scheme. Under the scheme, the outlay for replantation will be Rs. 100 crore covering 40,000 hectares, 75 per cent of which was in the State.

Quality upgradation, water augmentation and pollution abatement will get Rs. 40 crore, coffee development in the north eastern region Rs. 20 crore, coffee development in non-traditional areas (Andhra Pradesh and Orissa) Rs. 45 crore and capacity building for all stakeholders Rs. 10 crore.

He said Rs. 5 crore had been allocated for welfare support to labourers and tiny growers and Rs. 90 crore for interest subsidy to small and large growers. The Minister said that growers could get returns after four years and not eight years, as earlier thought of.

Mr. Ramesh said new varieties of cardamom would be planted in 15,000 hectares in Hassan, Kodagu, Chickmaglur and Uttara Kannada districts.

The growers who have plantation of less than four hectares would get 33 per cent subsidy and those who have plantations between four and eight hectares would get 25 per cent.

The cardamom in Karnataka was destroyed due to disease and low productivity. In Sakleshpur taluk alone, 50 per cent of the saplings would be planted over five years and then, the State would emerge as an important cardamom producer.

The Minister said that he had written to the State government asking that pepper cultivation be brought under the National Horticultural Mission.

He said electronic auction platforms would be set up in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka for auctioning cardamom. This will help farmers get better prices for the produce.

The scientists working in the research institutes for coffee, rubber and cardamom would be treated on a par with those in the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, he said.

The directors of these institutes, hitherto getting salaries and perks equivalent to that of a reader will now get the rank of professors/fellows.

The Minister thanked M. S. Swaminathan, Chairman, National Commission for Farmers, and C. N. R. Rao, Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister, for recommending improvement in the pay scales of the scientists in these research institutes. The Indian Institute of Science had agreed to collaborate in upgrading the scientific manpower engaged in these institutes.

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