Jute can stage more than a comeback
Mozzamel Haque
The closure of the Adamjee Jute Mills was a shocker to some trade unionists and like minded political leaders in Bangladesh. They saw in the move the curtain downing on an industry with a glorious past. But new jute based industries can create multiple benefits for the economy. First of all, these are likely to much increase the demand for raw jute or green jute. With this happening, the farmers of this country --for whom jute is the main cash crop-- would experience an increase in their earnings.
Presently, the lacklustre performance of the jute mills that produce traditional products like hessian and bags-- which have fluctuating demand and prices in the international market-- means that the mills cannot run on a high profit track. Thus, the mills naturally tended to keep production limited and this in turn also kept depressed the demand for raw jute. This scenario could completely change if new industries are set up to use jute unconventionally to produce goods for international market that would have sustainable demand and fetch good prices. In that situation, the demand for raw jute would certainly increase as, according to the familiar law of demand and supply, rising demand leads to higher prices of the commodities that are demanded or sold. Thus, the farmers -- who are preponderant in the countrys population-- would be directly benefited from growing jute. Recently, a number of foreign aided projects have progressed far that have already more or less confirmed that plants can be set up in Bangladesh to produce high quality pulp or paper or both from green jute. According to one estimate of the International Jute Study Group (IJSG), Bangladesh can set up mills to produce pulp from green jute plants that would not only meet its entire demand of pulp for making paper but would leave it with an exportable surplus of pulp to earn the equivalent of taka 250 billion in foreign currencies annually. Similar earning is also possible by making and exporting paper of different grades and kinds, including high quality papers, from jute.
Pulp making by using non jute products require extra costs. Chemical pulping by applying big amounts of chemicals in the pulping process or mechanical pulping by using a great deal of electricity are capital intensive processes. Chemical pulping requires a large amount of chemicals which make the product costlier and also pollutes the environment. Mechanical pulping, on the other hand, requires more energy.
Increasing production costs and environmental awareness made it necessary to investigate methods for reducing the use of chemicals and power in the pulping process. After nearly a decade of research, biopulping technology for pulp and paper making with environment friendly microorganisms has emerged and this process is also substantially cheaper than the chemical pulping or the power pulping process. What is more exciting is that the biopulping process seems more suited to jute than other raw materials for pulp or paper making. Thus, there has opened up now very bright prospects for Bangladesh to make quality pulp and paper at relatively cheaper costs with jute by utilising the biopulping technology and fast expanding sales of pulp and paper in international market because of the price competitiveness to be enjoyed by it for using this technology.
A bright outlook for greater use of jute is also there worldwide as the environmental concern peaks and manufacturers are increasingly searching for environment friendly and biodegradable products to replace synthetic or plastic products which are now considered as environmentally unsound. In observing the World Trade Organisation (WTO) guidelines, the use of synthetic fibres could be prohibited worldwide and opportunities would be created for the use of natural fibres instead. It is relevant to mention here that the Bangladesh Jute Research Institute (BJRI) and the French Institute for Textile and Clothing (IFTH) has started a joint project aimed at producing new products for household uses and clothing by way of blending jute with other natural fibres such as flax and cotton. Therefore, apart from cloth making, jutes uses could remarkably increase for making curtains, upholsteries, matting for embankments, etc.
The automobile industries worldwide include huge industrial establishments and in the wake of the prohibition on artificial materials much prospects could be created for the use of jute products in this industry. Typically, an automobile uses artificial fibre made products as its parts in thirty-seven places. After the introduction of the WTO regulation, the same thirty-seven parts could be made from jute to meet the needs of the regulation.
Thus, much demand for these jute based products in the automobile industry could be created internationally and Bangladesh could be in a leading position to meet this demand if it starts positioning itself from now. Reportedly, some foreign investors have already visited Dhaka to look for local partners who would join them in producing these jute based automobile parts in Bangladesh.
The government must now move with a real sense of urgency to effectively promote new uses of jute. The governments singular policy ought to be one of informing, persuading and facilitating entrepreneurs, local or foreign or under joint ventures, in every way to go for the setting up of these industries at the earliest to make new jute based products.
The new products are likely to be highly profitable for the entrepreneurs, earn huge foreign currency for the country, effect considerable import substitution ( as Bangladesh is now an importer of paper) and improve the countrys balance of payments position.
The writer is a former General Manager of the Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC)
