Minister of State of for Textiles Santosh Kumar Gangwar at the National Jute Board event held in Kolkata said that they expect to place the new proposed Textile Policy which will be a long term policy for 10 year in the Budget session of Parliament. As special incentives may to be announced for the eastern region states, the new textile policy is projected to benefit West Bengal in a big way.

Further, speaking about need for jute diversification, the minister said that the Centre, through the National Jute Board, is setting up three skill development centres for the diversified sector at National Jute Manufactures Corporation mills -- Howrah, Alaxendra and Kinnison – in West Bengal at a cost of Rs. 10 crore and provide direct employment to over 5,000 people.

The skill development centres will train in designing, development, production and marketing of diversified products.

The Minister also said that NJB has set up a common facility centre for processing, value-adding and marketing of jute diversified products at Dhaniakhali in Hoogly district of West Bengal at a cost of Rs. 2 crore.

This centre will be run through women self-help groups at block level formed under the National Rural Livelihood Mission. The self-help groups begun the training at Dhaniakhali centre from Friday. It is slated to provide employment to 1,000 women. NJB will provide working capital to women entrepreneurs.

Earlier this month, training had begun at Deganga centre in North 24 Pargana district.

Under a scheme, the Centre planned five common facility centres in three States – three in West Bengal, one each in Assam and Bihar. Assam has one such centre at Barpeta and Bihar at Katihar.

NJB has also set up a jute design centre at the National Institute of Design, Gandhinagar. NID would provide market worthy designs to these centres, the Minister added.

Gangwar also launched a new Jute Raw Material Bank (JRMB) Scheme under which each JRMB will be supported by over Rs 15 lakhs annually to help provide jute raw materials at reasonable price and in required quantity to the artisans, crafts person and weavers.

Union Textile secretary and Jute Board chairperson Rashmi Verma said that diversification is the only solution for sustainability and growth of the jute sector.

According to Jute Commissioner Subrata Gupta, these new skilling centres and CFC centres will help jute achieve its rightful place as a glory of the state. They will implement reforms and policy measures to put jute production back on the map.

The government is also looking into special incentives for manufacturing units to be set up in the Northeast, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

Though diversified products contribute just 5 percent of the jute sector’s total turnover, NJB plans to expand it through these steps.

According to the Minister, it is estimated that the jute industry provides direct employment to 40 lakh jute farming families and 3.7 lakh workers in the mills.