by Trishna Pegu Doley

Guwahati : A meeting of Tea Committee constituted under State Innovation and Transformation Aayog (SITA), Government of Assam was held in the presence of its Vice- Chairman Dipok Kumar Barthakur at his office chamber at Janata Bhawan, Dispur today. The meeting was chaired by the Committee chairman Dr. Mridul Hazarika to finalise the Report on Tea.

The meeting was attended by the members of the committee viz., Dr. K.M Bujarbaruah, Advisor SITA, T. Kabilan, Director, North East States, Niti Aayog, New-Delhi and representatives of Finance Department among others. The committee was constituted by the government with a mandate to take up a study on the various issues and challenges faced by the tea growers of Assam. Today’s meeting discussed the core problems of the Assam tea growers at length. Emphasis was given to device marketing strategies to promote tea as a health beverage.

The committee hoped for a proper branding of Assam tea to promote tea as a global drink. It discussed in detail the other issues such as climatic impact, feasibility of technological upgradation, enhancement of labour productivity etc. Prior to today’s meeting, a sitting was held yesterday with the representatives of Tea Board of Assam to hear their side of their grievances so that the committee may incorporate them in the final compilation of its report. Generation of authentic data relating to different aspects of entire tea sector has also been discussed during the meet. It needs to be mentioned that the committee had already submitted a report on Tocklai Tea Research Centre, Jorhat to the Government of Assam.