Bamboo at the common production centre at Lalapur in Kahalgaon and (below) the women of Antichak Tikar village make incense sticks in Bhagalpur. Pictures by Amit Kumar

Bhagalpur, June 10: Bihar regional office of Nabard is planning to provide income opportunities to the poor in Bhagalpur through bamboo production, which grows in abundance in the area.

Nabard has supported a credit-cum-grant programme under the umbrella of natural resource management (NRM) through Bihar Development Trust (BDT) since 2010-11 for harnessing the potential of bamboo in Bhagalpur.

Under the project, at least 50 new tillers would grow bamboo by captive farming and the women of the area will be engaged in making incense sticks from it.

Kahalgaon and the embankments of other blocks like Sabour, Naugachia, Gopalpur have been the natural habitat of bamboo. Bamboo is used for a range of activities like house construction, storage facility for grain and fodder, making baskets and has a local market demand.

Lack of captive farming in the project area has led to fast depletion of bamboo plantation and at present, a mature bamboo weighing about 20-25kg is available at Bhagalpur at Rs 75-90. Bamboo is being imported from neighbouring districts like Purnea, Katihar and also from states like Bengal, Assam and Tripura.

The project, thus, tries to address the larger issue of the need for bamboo cultivation and to make it attractive. It is also being made more livelihood-friendly for the poor.

Inkersal, co-ordinator of the project-monitoring unit, Nabard, said the project for providing livelihood opportunities among the poor at common production centre (CPC) near Lalapur was launched under the supervision of project monitoring unit — an in-house unit in Lucknow.

The CPC is functional since February 2011 and in a short span has become the hub of activities like training, awareness workshops, capacity building of self-help groups (SHGs) and activity-based groups and also for backward and forward linkages, including supply of raw materials and stocking of finished goods.

Dev Kumar Pandey of BDT said: “Around 200 women under 20 SHGs are associated with incense stick-making. Manju Devi of Lakshmi SHG of Antichak Tikar village and Kiran Devi of Bajrangbali SHG earned wages around Rs 4,500-5,000 in three-and-half months.”

He said the wages differ depending on the time put-in for making sticks by an individual. “It can be verified from the stick-production passbooks maintained for each member. The wages for a period of three-and-a-half-month ranged from Rs 500 to 5,000,” Pandey said.

He also said in the past three-and-a-half months, the agency has been able to market 25 tonnes of finished products to companies like Sewa (working for ITC’s Mangaldeep brand of incense sticks) and to Cycle brand of agarbattis in Gaya.

During June 2011, a consignment will be dispatched to Ahmedabad and ITC’s facility near Bhubaneswar and Bangalore. The executive emphatically added that the market demand is huge for incense sticks. A 1kg bundle generally contains 5,500 to 6,000 sticks and the price varies between Rs 22 and Rs 27 per kg. One 20kg bamboo is being procured at an average cost of Rs 20 to 25 and at 35 per cent optimum level of finished products, each bamboo gives around 7kg sticks.

At present, about 65 per cent of the natural resource is not utilised to the maximum in CPC.

BDT officials shared their plans to increase the utilisation of the natural resource and said that a recent tie-up with Siwan-based Husk Power Systems for supplying bamboo residuals has been made which will be used in power generation by the unit established there.

The bamboo dust is being sold to the poor women engaged in making puffed rice locally. However, BDT seeks Nabard support to set up captive power generation unit at Lalapur as well as help train women in handicraft making from bamboo residue. The handicraft would add value to the bamboo residue, which is presently being supplied at throwaway prices to Husk Power, Siwan.

“The women find it difficult to procure blades for their hand-held tool used in making sticks. If we have proper power supply, we could work easily,”said Lalmuniya Devi a stick-maker at Antichak Tikar village.

The farmers said pit digging in their fields have been completed. “BDT, through Nabard grant, organised skill training as well as motivational training for the stick rollers. The employees engaged in the project have also been trained and exposure visits are being planned in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh,” said Nabin Roy, district development manager, Nabard, Bhagalpur.