Silchar, Feb. 12: The tea industry in Assam has pleaded for ?restricting any further expansion of the areas under tea,? in a bid to correct the excessive supply of tea crop in the market. It also stressed the need to improve the labour productivity as part of the cost-cutting exercise and the ?rationalisation of manpower?.
Addressing the 103rd annual general conference of the Surma Valley branch of the Indian Tea Association (ITA) here today the ITA chairman C.K. Dhanuka said the urgency came in the wake of a persistent plummeting in the prices of tea crop and the simultaneous spiral in the cost of its production.
He said the tea industry had already highlighted these issues before the expert tea committee. The ITA had also pleaded with the committee to ensure the ?temporary withdrawal? of the green leaf cess at the rate of 29 paisa a kg, placement of tea in four per cent value-added tax (VAT) category and the reduction of the rate of the agriculture income tax on tea from the present 45 per cent to 35 per cent for bringing it at par with the income tax rate.
Dhanuka regretted that though the Centre had created a development fund out of the collections from the additional excise duty on tea at the rate of Re one per kg to help correct the Orthodox CTC mix and ensure the generic promotion of tea, there was ?no flow of this fund to the industry till date?.