Tea Board for strict adherence to food safety standards

In a bid to retain the markets of developed buying countries, Tea Board today asked the tea industry to strictly adhere to food safety standards.
"The importance of need for food safety cannot be overemphasised. Developed buying countries are putting stringent conditions on ensuring food safety which Indian producers will have to follow," Tea Board chairman Siddharth said at the AGM of the Calcutta Tea Traders Association (CTTA) here.
He said conditions imposed by countries like US and EU can't be ignored but would have to be honoured as these were major export destinations.
However, Siddharth said the trade missions located abroad are very active in pleading to the governments of these countries to do away with such non-tariff or technical barriers, adding that any retaliatory action by India would not yield result.

Siddharth said the Tea Board was also working on new schemes and policies for production and marketing.
He also informed that the Price Stabilisation Fund of Rs 500 crore created by the government 10 years back and which got expired in 2013, was being re-activated and could be used for protecting major price fall in commodities, including tea.