JUTE, the 100% biodegradable jute is a major textile fiber. It is a also a raw material for non-textile products, which helps to protect environment, which is an integral part of any development planning. In textile industry, Jute is qualified for its silky texture, high tensile strength and resistivity to heat and fire. Jute textiles lend a proportionate fusing of contemporaneous style and traditionalistic way of weaving.
Popularity of Jute Textiles
Jute is considered fit for use in industries as varied as fashion, travel and luggage, furnishings, carpets and floor coverings, decorative, textiles and made-ups. Jute textiles are extensively usable in different fashion outlets, malls, boutiques and departmental stores. Adorned with intricate ferments of beads and embroidery, these textiles are extremely impressive and eye-catching. Playing a vital role in Indian textile industry, Jute sector has gained immense popularity all across the globe.
Major Development Areas
India is known as the second largest exporter of jute goods in world. Along with this, Indian Jute Industry is the biggest manufacturer of raw jute and jute products in the world. Total Jute textiles in India are around 78%. Major areas which are popular and comprise jute mills are West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Tripura, Chattisgarh and Orissa.
Hessian cloth is generally used for packing or wrapping materials for agricultural products such as wool, cotton and tobacco and also in the upholstery industry.
Jute Geo-textiles are flexible, foldable, not very biodegradable, and water-resistant in nature, particularly suitable for rain-fed, flood-prone climatic conditions.
# Textiles & Jute policy, planning, implementation and evaluation. # Administration of state owned Textile and Jute industries and properties of BJC (Defunct) # Administration of Jute Ordinance, Formulation and Administration of Jute industries policy. # Coordination of internal and external marketing of Jute yarn and Textiles including synthetic, specialized, power loom and products and their transportation and shipment. # Overall Coordination of export of Textiles and Jute products and its market promotion and related matters. # Collection, processing and publication of all Textile statistics & statistics in respect of Jute industry, Jute production, Jute marketing and export etc. # Promotion and development of foreign investment in Textiles & Jute industries and employment of foreigners in Textile industries. # Correspondence, contracts and agreements with international agencies and other countries for technical cooperation and assistance in respect of Textiles & Jute products. # Regulation, Supervision and Certification of the standard and quality of Textiles & Jute products including their raw materials/ingredients. # Determination of overall requirements of raw materials for government-owned Textiles and Jute Industries and formulation of policy guidelines in this respect. # To facilitate promotion of Textile and Jute industries and related matters in the private sector. # Promotion, Research and development of Textiles and Textile raw materials. # Technological (Industrial) Research of Jute and Diversified Jute Products and development of Diversified Jute Products and their market research. # Promotion, establishment balancing and modernization and replacement of Textile mills/factories in public sector and handlooms. # Setting up of Commissions as and when required on any subject for study/investigation on Textiles & Jute industries. # Matters relating to Textiles & Jute industries, Jute and Textile products. # Education and training of Textiles and Jute technology and human resource development in these sectors. # Administration and control including financial matters, relating to this Ministry and subordinate/attached Department, Directorate, Corporation, Board and other Agencies. # Supervision and regulation of dealing in Textiles, Textile products, Jute and Jute manufactures. # Agreement for transport and shipment of Jute and Jute goods manufactured within the country and to foreign countries. # Matters relating to Sericulture Industries. # Matters relating to Primary Textiles, Jute sector of the country and their Technical Evaluation. # Liaison with International Organizations and matters relating to treaties and agreements with other countries and world bodies relating to subjects allotted to this Ministry. # Regulation and issue of licences to dealers, exporters of Jute & Jute manufacturers and occupiers of Jute Mills and if necessary suspension of such licence. # All laws on subjects allotted to this Ministry. # Inquiries and statistics on any of the subjects allocated to this Ministry. # Fees in respect of any of the subjects allotted to this Ministry except fees taken in courts. # To facilitate Jute, Ready Made Garments (RMG) and Primary Textiles including allied textile-processing industries. # Matters relating to the Backward & Forward linkages on Textiles, Jute, Textile goods & Jute goods. Matters relating to International Jute Study Group (IJSG) and other Agencies/International bodies engaged in the welfare/Development of Jute
The cost of jute varies linking Tk 950 and Tk 1200 per pound this year. Farmers get around 12 pound of jute fibre per bigha while the cultivation cost does not exceed Tk 2,500 and the farmers are receiving good income from jute cultivation now, said Sirajul Islam, a farmer in Shanthia upazila under Pabna district.
Only three years ago, the cost of jute fibre went losing to around Tk 250-300 per pound and the farmers had approximately deserted calming jute as it was not cost valuable.
“Fall in jute manufacture in India and China in the last two years hard-pressed up the insist of jute from Bangladesh. As a result the cost went up,” supposed BJA Vice-president Puspendu Mohan Saha.
Puspendu Mohan Saha said the price of high-grade jute also showed optimism this year. Last year the volume of uncooked jute sell abroad from Bangladesh was around 24.47 lakh bales. India imported around 10 lakh bale jute from Bangladesh due to production shortfall there.
Similar amount of jute is expected to be exported this year, he added.
A group of farmers chatting to The Daily Star reporter at Ghugudoher beel (marshy land) had spoken joy ended the boost of price of jute fibre.
During visits in the district, this correspondent found huge areas under jute fostering. At some places, jute plants have by now been harvested and the new fibre has also ongoing coming in the market.
Although happy with the rise in jute price, the farmers said they do not get the price affirmed by the administration owned jute mills.
Instead of directly buying from the farmers, the traders buy jute from their nominated middlemen, said jute farmer Abdul Karim.
Around 50 lakh bales of jute are expected to be produced in the country this year, BJA sources said, adding that around 30 lakh bales will be inspired in the local mills and factories and the rest will be exported. Nearly 70 per cent of jute has by now been harvest.
Jute industry in the country is facing a crisis due to a fall in demand and prices of jute products because of the global monetary depression increase in production cost and devaluation of rupee in India, the main competitor of Bangladesh in the export market for jute goods.
If the trend continues, most of the jute mills will have to suspend production, and this will threaten livelihoods of around 80 thousand workers in the industry comprising about 150 mills, they added.
“Manufacture in many jute mills has by now been suspended and many others are incurring huge losses as they are exporting their products at prices lower than manufacture costs,” said Bangladesh Jute Spinners Association (BJSA) Chairman Shabbir Yusuf.
Chairman Shabbir Yusuf. mentioned that their suggestions include reducing interest rate on running capital loaned by commercial banks, increasing export subsidy and creating a crisis fund for jute industry.
BJSA Secretary Shahidul Karim said jute spinning mills are the worst affected now as yarn is used in preparing carpets but their sales in the Western countries have dropped significantly due to a slump in real estate business.
The country earned Tk 2,200 core in foreign swap from export of jute supplies. The industry gets almost 100 percent of its raw materials nationally.
Shabbir Yusuf said foreign buyers are asking the millers to reduce prices of jute products by 15 percent, and are moving to India as it can now sell jute goods at prices 30 percent less than of Bangladesh due to devaluation of rupee.
Bangladesh Jute Mills friendship (BJMA) Chairman Najmul Huq said production cost of jute products has gone up by around 45 percent. Average price of raw jute this year is around Tk 1,200 a maund against around Tk 700 last year. Annual production of raw jute in recent years was over 60 lakh bales but this year it is estimated at around 50 lakh bales.
He noted that Indian rupee has been devalued by around 21 percent against dollars because of the recent economic meltdown in the West. “As a result, we are failing to sustain in the competition with India in exporting jute products,” he said.
An official of Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC) said the state-owned BJMC mills are also facing shortage of raw jute. Almost all the machines for carpet-backing clothes are lying idle, he added.
It recommended creating a crisis fund for jute industry to help it continue production.
The importance of one cash crop overshadows all else as the source of Bangladesh's export earnings. Bangladesh is the world's largest producer of jute, a fibrous substance used in making burlap, sacks, mats, rope and twine, and carpet backing. Jute is sold on the international market either raw or in the form of manufactured goods. This so-called "golden fiber" is cultivated on the same land as rice; thus each season farmers must decide which crop to plant.
During the colonial period, when East Bengal was used by the British to produce primary goods for processing elsewhere, raw jute was the main product. Calcutta became the manufacturing center where jute was transformed into twine and rope, sacking material, and carpet backing. The partition of British India in 1947 put an international boundary between the source of the basic commodity and the manufacturing center and imposed a great burden on Pakistan to compensate for the disruption of the industry that was its greatest source of foreign earnings. Between 1947 and 1971 jute mills were constructed in East Pakistan, but industrialization proceeded slowly.
In the 1960s, petroleum-based synthetics entered the market, competing with jute for practically all of its uses. The upheavals culminating in the emergence of independent Bangladesh drove many traditional buyers of jute to shift to synthetics. World trade in jute and jute goods declined absolutely from 1.8 million tons in 1970 to 1.5 million tons in 1982. Despite some major year-to-year swings, prices fell precipitously through the mid-1980s. Prices were too low to cover the costs of production, but the government nonetheless deemed it essential to subsidize growers and industry and ensure the continued existence of as large a foreign market as possible.
There have been enormous year-to-year fluctuations both of producer prices and of production. An extreme example occurred between FY 1984 and FY 1986. Carry-over stocks had been run down since the previous production surge in FY 1980, and serious floods in 1984 resulted in unanticipated production losses. The price doubled to US$600 per ton at the export level, which triggered the traditional response of farmers; they planted much more of their land in jute, and between one year and the next production rose more than 50 percent, from 5.1 million bales in FY 1985 to 8.6 million bales the following year. History proved true to itself yet again when export prices then fell by 50 percent at the export level and by more than 30 percent at the farm-gate level.
When the farm-gate price for jute is 50 percent higher than the price for rice, farmers respond by planting more land in jute at the expense of rice. With the expansion of irrigation facilities in the 1980s, the economic incentives to stick with rice have increased, but there may be scope for increasing jute production by substituting it for the low-yield broadcast auks rice grown on unrelated land during the same season as jute.
High as Bangladesh's share of world trade has been--in 1985 it amounted to 77 percent of all raw jute trade and 45 percent of jute goods--there are realistic possibilities for expanding the share still further. The World Bank has estimated that Bangladesh's share could rise to 84 percent for raw jute and 55 percent for manufactures. Jute production appeared in the late 1980s to be an essential part of the long-term development plan because, for all the troubles and struggles associated with its planting and marketing, no alternative activity offered any promise of being more profitable.
Of thirty major primary commodities traded internationally, only about six have as much price and supply instability as jute. In FY 1986 export sales remained low despite a 35-percent decline in export prices; the fall in world oil prices had also resulted in declines in the prices of polypropylene substitutes for jute as well, and most buyers that had switched to synthetics chose not to return to jute. In the late 1980s, there was nothing in the offing to arrest the trend of several decades of decreasing global demand for jute and declines in the value of jute relative to the goods Bangladesh must import to meet the basic needs of a desperately poor economy.
Some hope for a better future has been placed in cooperation among jute-producing countries through the International Jute Organization, based in Dhaka. Member countries in 1988 were the producing countries of Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Nepal, and Thailand and more than twenty consuming countries, including the United States. The goals of the fledgling International Jute Organization were appropriately modest to begin with, centering on better dissemination of basic information, coordination of agricultural and industrial research and of economic studies, and steps toward coordination of marketing. It remained to be seen in mid-1988 whether this poorly financed new organization, representing the first feeble effort at a coordinated approach to the problems of jute, would be effective in arresting its long decline as an important international commodity.
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