Kerala’s coir industry will be thrown open for large scale industrialisation, Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Isaac has said.

“New technologies will be encouraged and government will give subsidy to facilitate private players who would make large scale investments,” he told on December 5.

The Minister was speaking to reporters after the Kerala Coir Corporation entered into a tie-up with the Uttar Pradesh Cooperative Federation to sell coir products in the latter’s 10,000-odd outlets.

Isaac said the government will offer an income support scheme for workers who would lose jobs after industrialisation. “It will be a socially regulated mechanisation. The Government will compensate workers in the unorganised who would lose jobs,” he said.

Each employee will get income assistance for 200 days in a year. “Workers can sell raw coir to the Coirfed and products to the Coir Corporation. The Coirfed will sell the products to exporters at a ten percent discount,” he said.

Isaac said processing of green husks will be encouraged among coir units. “Tamil Nadu has set a best example by dehusking green husks. They sell the coir pith to meet the husk procurement price. But in Kerala, decayed husks are used and the salty pith is of no commercial value,” he said.  He opined that small-scale mechanisation will not help the sector in the long run.

Coir Corporation-UPCF MoU

Isaac said the MoU was the biggest revival effort in the history of coir industry in state. The memorandum was signed by Coir Corporation Managing Director G N Nair and UPCF General Manager Ashok Kumar Yadav. UPCF Managing Director Karan Singh Chouhan said orders worth Rs 1 crore will be placed in the first phase.

Source: The New Indian ExpImage 

Image Courtesy: Seasonal Magazine