By STS Lepcha
India is blessed with 148 species of bamboo with 29 genera covering 15.69 million hectares of land. Most of the bamboo is distributed in forest regions and has a substantial contribution to ecology such as enhancing wildlife habitats, forest hydrology as effectively as delivering possibilities for livelihood development of the rural poor. Bamboo also aids to lower the impact of climate adjust by releasing more Oxygen than trees and sequencing more Carbon on soil. Recent investigation has also shown that it can strengthen water holding capacity of the watershed regions by 20% to 25%. Therefore Bamboo is a “Green as well as a pro-poor” resource. That implies bamboo has to play a substantial part in fulfilling the sustainable development ambitions (SDGs) of India.
Government of India (GoI) has identified the worth of bamboo as early as 2006-2007, initiating the National Bamboo Mission (NBM) below Agriculture Ministry (a Centrally Sponsored Scheme with an initial budgetary allocation of 500 crores+ which was expanded additional in the 10th program, and whose 1st phase lasted upto 2015-2016). GoI also began the National Mission on Bamboo Development (NMBA) below the Department of Science and Technology for building industrial applications for bamboo. The 2nd phase of NBM began in 2018-2019 and is ongoing. The initial phase of NBM focused on resource generation by means of plantation in Forest regions, the second phase has focused on plantation in the regions out-side of forest land so that rural men and women could get more economic advantage from bamboo sources by promoting it to industries. Kudos to the present Government that they have recognized bamboo as a ‘grass not a tree’, and have issued a government order (GO) that states any person can reduce and transport bamboo expanding in outdoors forest regions without the need of permission from the government. This GO has boosted farmers to plant more bamboo in their land to fulfill the demand of industries all through the year.
While regular utilizes of bamboo as scaffolding and basketry are effectively identified, increasingly bamboo is discovering applications in revolutionary new goods such as furnishings, decor, beverages, engineered bamboo goods, activated bamboo charcoal, bamboo textiles, organic pesticides / fungicide, bio- plastic granules and so forth. The Bamboo marketplace size worth was about US$72.10 billion in 2019 and is anticipated to attain US$ 98.30 billion by 2025. Global marketplace share of China in bamboo is about 70% whereas inspite of Government efforts, India has just 4%. Countries like Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia and so forth have more marketplace share than India.
Barring the North Eastern area, bamboo is referred to as the “poor man’s timber’ in other parts of India. In other Asian countries Bamboo is regarded as a “Friend’ and a “Brother”, as it is aspect of their culture and use in each day life. Reasons for disinterest in bamboo inside India might also be due to the weak information base for bamboo sources, lack of skilled manpower, lack of sophisticated R&D, no technique for use of waste components, weak cross-sectoral synergy as effectively as lack of strategic preparing which has led to lack of manpower and economic sources all through the nation.
However, the image is not completely so gloomy. There is a have to have to retrofit policy and additional strategize for a hybrid phase. There is a have to have to look at bamboo with a renewed focus. Some action points recommended are:
(1) Establish a complete-fledged Institution for Bamboo on the lines of the Coir Board, Tea Board and Rubber Board amongst other folks for advertising Bamboo based financial enterprise, building an correct bamboo resource inventory and coordinating with unique ministries supporting bamboo activities. This could most probably function below the Industry Department.
(2) Create and Develop Bamboo Special Economic Zones in bamboo resource wealthy regions or states, focusing on “one economically important bamboo species” as per a Growth pole technique. The rationale becoming that Bamboo based industries are species-certain, which means only particular species are great for a unique application and the expense of transporting bamboo is also pretty higher. So a ‘species focused’ method will assistance the Indian bamboo sector compete with other Asian bamboo industries.
(3) Improve R&D in bamboo by introducing incentivization in the program exactly where at least 30% to 40% patent income is shared with the Scientists undertaking the R&D. Similarly, the GOI could incentivize industries which create green revolutionary goods by providing tax holidays for such goods for 2 to 3 years.
(4)The Bamboo market generates more than 80% waste so it would be strategic to incentivize such industries to convert waste into revolutionary goods. Subsidies could be offered to ancillary industries to method bamboo waste.
(The author is Retired Senior Forest Officer of Uttarakhand Cadre and also Former Expert Member in Executive Committee of National Bamboo Mission (NBM), Government of India (GoI).The post is for informational purposes only. Views expressed are private and do not reflect the official position or policy of the TheSpuzz Online).