History of Jute

Jute is cultivated in India for centuries. In Europe towards the end of the eighteenth century, East India Company introduced jute fibre in their search as a substitute for flax in packaging application. It was 1793 when the first despatch of about 100 tons of raw jute left India. And the first Jute mill was set up at Dundee in England in the year 1830. During the war of Crimea in 1853 the supply of sunnhemp from Russia fell short in European market consequencing the export of Bengal's Jute to Europe at a fast rate. During the 40 years from 1828 to 1868 the export of raw jute from Bengal reached from 1200 ton to 2,62,800 ton. Throughout this period Dundee of Scotland maintained the dominance in the production of jute goods. Later on, the British industrialists diverted their attention to establish jute mill in Bengal due to availability of raw jute and skilled labour at low wage.

The landmark in the history of jute industry in India dates back to 1854 when the British industrialist George Auckland set up the first jute mill at Rishra in the Hooghly district of West Bengal. In 1870 altogether five jute mills started production in Bengal. These five mills were run by 5000 workers through 950 looms.

During the first four decades of the 20th Century the number of jute mills as well as the number of workers increased at fast rate as indicated in Table 1.

TABLE 1 Jute Mills & the Workers in the Early Century Year No. of Jute Mills No. of Workers 1912 1921 1926 1931 1941 61 77 86 93 101 1,99,725 2,81,848 3,27,547 2,68,289 2,86,181

The total investment in jute also increased significantly. While in 1904 the total investment in jute industry was Rs. 6 crores 8 lacs, the amount reached Rs. 26 crores 85 lacs in the year 1924.

Unfortunately during the post independence period when the ownership of jute mills was transferred to Indian industrialists, there had been significant downfall in the industry as noted from the Table 2.

TABLE 2 Jute Mills & the Workers in the Late Century Year No. of Jute Mills No. of Workers 1951 1961 1971 1981 1991 1992 1993 1994 95 83 75 60 57 57 57 57 2,55,581 1,92,130 2,11,847 1,80,000 1,70,000 1,70,000 1,70,000 1,70,000

Interestingly, although the number of jute mills started decreasing, there was no fall in the total production of jute goods. The total production of jutegoods during the first five year plan (1951-55) was 10,21,200 ton which increased to13,04,500 ton during the VI five year plan (1981-84); and this increased to 19,00,000 ton in the VIII five year plan (1991-95).

It is also worth noting that during the early period of this century 20% of the total production met the domestic market demand and then 80% was exported to outside countries. But gradually the picture reversed. During 1990-95,15.5 lac ton of the total jute goods met the demand of the country market while3.5 lac ton goods were exported to foreign market.

Before1947 India exercised a monopoly in raw jute export. After the partition of the country the centres of production remained in West Bengal while the fields were clustered in Bangladesh. Also the quality of jute produced in Bangladesh is superior to that of India's. And this has resulted in Bangladesh doing much better than India in exports of conventional jute items where the quality of the product is the yardstick. Later, Bangladesh established her ownjute mills also for manufacture of finished jute goods. Jute & Kenaf are primarily cultivated in developing countries like India, Bangladesh, China, Thailand, Nepal and others. Bangladesh now faces competition from India, China, Thai­land, Nepal and her position as the largest producer of raw ) jutewas overtaken by India in1981. Post partition India started with 0.652 million acres, producing 1.658million bales (1 bale : 180 Kg.). This fed 108 jute mills requiring 7.2 million bales and the resulting short fall led to one working shift and closure of some mills. India gradually increased jute production. Table 3 outlines the history of raw jute production since 1947.

TABLE 3 Area, Production & Yield of Raw Jute in Different Plan Period Plan Period Area Production Yield 1947-48 Pre-Plan I Plan II Plan III Plan Ann. Plan 66-69. IV Plan V Plan VI Plan VII Plan VIII Plan 264.0 411.3 645.4 704.2 847.2 734.5 765.0 695.9 859.4 818.6 802.8 658.0 2545.0 392.8 4441.0 5683.6 4869.8 5495.1 4906.2 6270.9 6419.5 7562.6 - 1113.8 1095.7 1135.2 1207.6 1193.4 1293.0 1269.0 1313.4 1411.6 1695.7

Area : '000 ha, Production '000 bales of 180 Kg., Yield '000 Kg / ha

In India two popular species of jute viz. Corchorus Capsularis (white jute) & Corchorus Olitorius (Tossa jute) are cultivated. There are specific variations in the two species. The Olitorius species is more commonly grown in India. The important varieties grown in the country are JRO 632, 7835, 524, 878 and JRC 212, 7447, 4444, 321 and others. The major jute growing states are West Bengal, Assam, Bihar, Orissa, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh. There are large variations in the yield per ha. in different jute growing states. The available variety of jute yields as high as 40 Q/ha of fibre while the annual average is around 16 to 18 Q/ha.

Currently the production of the fibre is around 90 lac bales and about 77 jute mills are operating in the country at present. Besides, there are several small scale industries in the decentralised sector producing handicrafts, decoratives and twines from jute and allied fibres Out of the total world production of about 3574.2 thousand metric tonnes, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Thailand produce 1800, 1100, 36 and 106 (97-98) thousand metric tonnes respectively. So long jute was known as low value industrial fibre for manufacturing coarse fabrics for packaging. But then there has been a sea change during the eighties. World jute scenario has significantly changed in the last two decades, with developing countries having their share of jute and juteproducts of the world increased from 50 to 80% while the share of developed countries reduced from 48 to 20%. Under this ambience jute producing countries have concentrated their thoughts to develop alternative uses of jute to sustain the production and demand for jute in order to ensure fair price to the poor farmers. Today jute can be redefined as an eco friendly natural fibre with versatile application prospects ranging from low value geo-textiles to high value carpet, apparel, composite, decoratives etc. Even the wastes byproduct like jute stick traditionally used as alternative fuel in village household is now being used for particleboard in various applications. Jute with its unique versatility rightfully deserves to be branded as "The fibre for the future" Today jute industry alone employs 4 million farmers and 2,32,000 workers of the 27.06 million employed people.

It can well be noted that the estimated production of jute, kenaf during 1990-91 was 3600 thousand metric tonnes in major jute producing countries. The domestic consumption or requirement in the developing countries amounted to 3202 thousand metric tonnes. About 398 thousand metric tonnes only were available for export. It clearly indicates that jute and allied fibre commodities are primarily produced and consumed by developing countries.

Today, jute has been stretching its field to wide and diverse areas emerging into transdiciplinary horizon so much so that jute now takes care to prevent soil erosion, save seeds and nurture new vegetation.