Severe power outages hit Sylhet tea industry

It is causing production loss to gardens and affecting quality of the sensitive crop, which may tell upon export of the major foreign exchange earner, they said.

Out of total 160 tea gardens in the country, 140 are in Sylhet region, which produce the major portion of quality tea. Most of the gardens are in Moulvibazar and Habiganj districts.

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The Habiganj Palli Bidyut Samity and the Moulvibazar Palli Bidyut Samity supply power to tea gardens in the two districts.

On an average, power outage in the gardens continues five to six hours a day, and up to 10 hours at times.

The condition in gardens under Habiganj Palli Bidyut Samity is worse as supply is interrupted twice or thrice a day.

Processing tea leaves in factories is seriously affected due to repeated power outage. Low voltage is another problem, which damages machinery, garden owners said while talking to this correspondent on Tuesday.

After plucking, processing of tea leaves involves withering, cutting, fermenting, drying and sorting to make it ready for packing and export. Accurate timing has to be maintained at each stage.

If power goes without any prior notice, it creates a total dislocation in the whole system.

In Madhobpur in Habiganj district, processing plants in five gardens are being run with generators as power outage continues up to 10 hours a day. This involved a huge expenditure but still, the quality of processed tea can not be maintained, some of the garden owners said.

Several rallies were held at Madhobpur upazila headquarter in the last fortnight and memoranda handed over to the local administration, warning of tougher agitation programmes.

Sources said tea gardens in the region need about 20 Megawatt power but only eight Megawatt is supplied on an average.

Sources in Habiganj Palli Bidtyut Samity and Moulvibazar Palli Bidyut Samity said they need 55 Megawatt for the region but get only 19 Megawatt.

The government had taken up programmes several times in last ten years to set up small power plants to ensure uninterrupted power supply to tea gardens, but to no effect yet.

In 1997, a decision was taken at ministry level to supply additional 10 MW power to tea gardens. But it is yet to be implemented.

On the other hand, the Rural Electrification Board (REB) in 2000 cancelled setting up of a 10 Megawatt power plant at private initiative for tea gardens after selection of site at Shaistaganj in Habiganj district.

They did it on the ground that such a plant at Shaistaganbj would not be commercially viable, sources said.

Besides, a plan for setting up two 35 MW plants in Moulvibazar and Habiganj, taken up in 2002 by the government in 2002, is gathering dust, they said.