Ranchi, Jan 5: United Bank of India's (UBI) advances to tea gardens in Assam and West Bengal will be higher this year than the previous years. Chairman and managing director of UBI Biswajit Chaudhuri told The Financial Express that the bank has decided to release ten per cent of its total advance budget funds to the gardens in 1999, considering improvement in non-performing assets (NPAs) on the advances to tea gardens.Chaudhuri said UBI has already completed the process of lending nearly Rs 400 crore in advance to the gardens in the current calendar year.
Ashok Biswas, chief manager (tea), said this year's `good' tea season (March to December) and `conducive' market has prompted the decision to lend 10 per cent this year against 8.5 per cent in 1997 (Rs 308 crore).
Biswas said the number of borrowers in tea gardens has increased to 134. He said in 1998, UBI advanced Rs 205 crore, Rs 32 crore and Rs 5 crore to the gardens in Assam, West Bengal and Tripura respectively. Besides, in south India, UBI has five borrowers which were provided with Rs 9 crore advance. The bank gave Rs 8 crore as loans to gardens in Arunachal and Orissa last year.
Stating that tea production in India has increased, Biswas said in 1996, 1997 and 1998 India's tea production was 780 million kg, 810 mkg and 846 mkg respectively.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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