The Bengal government has constituted seven task forces — one at the state level and six at the district level — to enforce prohibition on the sale, distribution and use of insecticides and pesticides that are banned in the cultivation and processing of tea or tea-related products.
On April 4, chief secretary Manoj Pant issued a two-page notification of the state labour department, stating that the task forces, comprising officials of different state government departments, would also ensure that the tea leaves and processed teas were regularly checked so that the brew did not contain any such banned chemical.
In April last year, small tea growers were in a fix as the bought–leaf factories (BLFs) or standalone tea processing units had stopped buying tea leaves from them.
This came in the wake of a tea board notification, referring to a directive of the Food Safety & Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), which stated that if any banned chemical was found in a tea sample processed in a BLF, the BLF concerned would be held responsible.
As the BLF owners bought tea leaves from growers, they did not know whether the growers used such chemicals, and so they stopped buying tea leaves from growers.
The distressed growers approached chief minister Mamata Banerjee, who intervened and said the state would come up with certain mechanisms to stop the use of such chemicals. Eventually, the BLFs resumed buying tea leaves from the growers.
In June last year, the principal secretary of the state industry, commerce and enterprises department came up with a standard operating procedure (SOP) to check the sale and use of such chemicals.
“Now, the task forces are yet another move by the state to confirm that quality teas, which do not have the banned chemicals, are produced in the state. The task forces have been entrusted with specific responsibilities, including preventing teas from Nepal from entering India without necessary tests,” said a senior official of the state labour department.
According to the notification, the state-level task force has the secretary of the state labour department as the chairman, while the labour commissioner of the state will be the secretary-cum-convener of the force.
It also has the commissioner of state food safety, who works under the health and family welfare department, the inspector general of police (north Bengal) and an officer not below the rank of joint secretary of the agriculture department as members.
Along with the state-level task force, district-level task forces or DLTFs have been constituted in the tea-producing districts of Bengal, namely, Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Cooch Behar, Jalpaiguri, Alipurduar and North Dinajpur.
The district magistrates head the DLTFs, with the additional or deputy labour commissioners as secretary-cum-conveners, and SPs, CMOHs, deputy directors of agriculture and food analysts of regional food safety labs as members.
In recent years, stakeholders of the tea industry have time and again expressed their concern over the influx of teas from Nepal. Such teas are not tested and are either sold at the Indian market or exported abroad, they had pointed out.
The notification also mentions that the police will take steps to prevent the movement of vehicles carrying tea leaves or processed tea without a tea sample testing report across international border or inter-state borders, and ensure that every consignment of tea entering India from Nepal is accompanied by a no-objection certificate issued by a competent authority with sample analysis report that matches the stipulations of the FSSAI.
“If any consignment is found with such documents, such teas will be confiscated and samples will be sent for tests. The importer concerned will have to bear the costs,” said a source.
Stakeholders of the tea industry in north Bengal welcomed the initiative.
“This decision by the state government will help in the production of quality teas in north Bengal and will also stop the entry of non-tested teas from Nepal. Improvement in the quality of teas will also help better price realisations in the coming days,” said Bijoygopal Chakraborty, the president of the Confederation of Indian Small Tea Growers’ Associations.