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Inferior Indian jute seed invades Bangladesh

By Shaner Khan
A low-quality but high yielding Indian lute seed is eating up Bangladesh's 'golden fibre' cultivation.
According to sources, farmers are Increasingly planting this low-quality Indian jute seed in the border areas of the country and also in Farid pur and North Bengal.
As a result, production of the traditional fine quality golden fibre' Is rapidly decltn-ing-
Jute Minister Brig (retd) A S M Hannan Shah, talking to The Daily Star, termed the mass usage of the inferior jute seed a '■threat"
He said that this may result
In the emergence of a hybrid •jute seed and feared that the high quality Bangladeshi Tosa-B seed may disappear one day.
While the 'golden fibre' of Bangladesh, specially that grown in the Faridpur region, is strong, thin and receives a good dyeing quality, the jute from the Indian seed cultivated in the region is weak, thick, wasteful and has poor dyeing qualities.
The concerned sources said that the farmers picked up the Indian variety because only 15 maunds of the Tosa-B fibre grow one acre of land while 20 to 25 maunds of the Indians
variety could be grown 1n the same area of land.
That 1s why.' the Jute Minister toki The Daily Star." nobody can stop the farmers from cultivating Indian Jute."
"In order to stop them." he added."we must develop our own high yielding Jute, seed."
The Minister said that he had instructed the Jute Research Institute lost June to invent a high- yielding Jute seed by 1993.
He added that the Jute farmers received Taka 450 for a maund of Tosa-B jute and no more than Tk 200 for the low-quality Indian Jute. This is also working as an incentive to sculpturing the traditional jute," he said.
In Bangladesh, jute is being cultivated on about 1.2 million' acres of land. Of this 1.19 lakh acres in greater Farldpur are used for cultivation of the best quality Jute.
Jute experts fear that although export of Jute has not been affected by the declining quantity of the fine golden fibre until now, the present trend of cultivating Indian Jute would compel foreign countries to stop buying Bangladesh Jute within five years.
Bangladesh exports about 2 million bales of Jute annually.
The Jute production in fiscal 1991-92 was 52.73 lakh bales (one bale equals 180 kg).
But sources anL the Jute Minister said that the produce was rather low In quality due to inadequate rainfall.
The Jute Minister indicated that the jute policy in the process of formulation, would consider the problem arising out of the cultivation of Indian jute seeds and would also alm at conserving the Bangladeshi seed.