Khadi kicks off 'Make in India' initiative

Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) has once again appeared as a torch-bearer of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's call and vision of 'Make in India'. With plantation drive of saplings of special variety of Bamboos having its botanical name 'Bamboosa Tulda' launched recently in New Delhi at Chanakyapuri, KVIC has derived a novel and innovative way to check the wastage of time and money being spent by India's manufacturers of incense sticks in importing raw bamboo sticks and raw Agarbatti from China and Vietnam.

New Delhi Lok Sabha MP Meenakshi Lekhi and KVIC Chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena, on this occasion, planted 100 saplings of Bamboosa Tulda, which would be used exclusively for agarbatti-manufacturing.

KVIC Chairman informed that taking cognisance of steep decline in setting up of new Agarbatti manufacturing units in the country and multi-dimensional problems of Agarbatti industry in India, KVIC had conducted an internal research and found that if local farmers start growing high-quality bamboos on their lands, it would end total dependence on import of raw Agarbattis and sticks from abroad, which would not only save precious Forex, but also create employment opportunities to the people engaged in it, besides increasing the income of the farmers.

Stating that despite huge employment potential in Bamboo sector, number of agarbatti projects have been declining and leading to heavy employment loss, Saxena said that since import duty on raw Agarbatti had been reduced from 30% to 10% in 2011 and gradually brought down to 5% in 2018 due to Indo-ASEAN Free Trade Agreement (FTA), import of raw Agarbatti into India had been surged from mere Rs 31 crore per annum in 2009 to 546 crore in 2018.

KVIC has planned to plant 20,000 Bamboosa Tulda every year, so that dependency on import of bamboos could be checked by 2022.