Jashpurnagar. After the success of the first phase of the tea garden scheme in the district, the district administration is now going to expand it. Under this, tea garden is now being expanded in 95 acres in Manora and Bagicha blocks. 72 farmers of both these blocks had given consent to develop tea garden on their land. After planting shade tree species for tea plants on the selected land, the work of planting tea plants is being done rapidly these days.
The administration is developing tea gardens under MNREGA and other government schemes. In the first phase, for four years, the team of Horticulture Department will develop the plants along with training these farmers with the help of experts. Later the gardens will be handed over to the farmers. Then the farmers will themselves manage their garden in the group.
For information, let us inform that the tea plantation in the district was started in the year 2007 from Sogra of Manora block. Here under the guidance of Aghoreshwar Sambhav Ramji of Sarveshwari Ashram, tea plants were brought from Assam and planted in the premises of the ashram. The success of Sogda tea garden under the supervision of international tea expert ID Singh soon started making headlines in the country and the state.
Inspired by this, the state government started a tea garden in the year 2011 on 20 acres of land belonging to 11 farmers at Dharuakona in Sarudih village of Jashpur block. After the success of tea plantation in Sogra and Sarudih, it is being expanded continuously. The state government is now preparing tea plants in Jashpur itself. Along with this, two tea processing units have also been established in the district. The first processing unit is operated in Sarveshwari Ashram Sogra, while the government processing unit is running in Balachapar under the supervision of Forest Department.
expansion in 95 acres
In the second phase of expansion of tea garden in the district, 3 lakh 58500 tea plants are being planted in Manora and Bagicha blocks in 95 acres. For this, 72 farmers have made their land available to the administration. Financial and technical assistance is being provided to these farmers on this land from the Mineral Trust Fund along with MNREGA and other government schemes.
Under the One District One Focus Scheme, the district administration will develop this tea garden in the next four years and hand over the care of the tea garden to the farmers by training them in the technique of plucking tea leaves. With the development of tea garden, the farmers will get direct economic benefit from this cash crop. Due to this, 105 families of these two hilly Korwa dominated blocks of the district are also getting employment as laborers in the tea garden. With this, the problem of migration and human trafficking is also expected to be solved.
potential of tea tourism
Due to the fast growing tea plantation in the district, now the possibility of tea tourism in the district is also increasing rapidly. Along with the district, tourists from Odisha, Jharkhand as well as other districts of the state have started arriving to see the tea gardens located in Sogra and Sarudih. In view of the increasing number of tourists, the forest department has also imposed an entry fee of Rs 10 in Sarudih. This amount is given to the women self-help group taking care of the tea garden. The possibility of tea tourism is expected to increase further in the coming days due to the expansion of the tea garden being done in the plateau region of the garden area.
Posted By: Yogeshwar Sharma
www.naidunia.com
