Chungtia village envisions making eri hub

Our Correspondent

Mokokchung, June 9 (EMN): Chungtia village council (CVC) has planned its vision to transform the village into ericulture commercial hub within three years (2018-19 to 2020-2021).

To realise its vision, Eri Silk Development for Women Empowerment (ESDWE) in Chungtia village under Mokokchung district has been constituted by Central Muga Eri Research & Training Institute, Lahdoigarh, Jorhat, in Assam. The project was sponsored by Central Silk Board, Ministry of Textiles, Government of India.

ESDWE nodal officer, Imotemjen Longkumer, informed that the funding agency Ministry of Textiles under NER-Textile Promotion scheme has sanction INR 17.74 crore and has put Chungtia village council in-charge as the executing agency.

It may be mentioned that Smriti Zubin Irani during the inauguration/ launching of sericulture projects in Nagaland on February 2, 2019, has assured to implement Eri Silk Development for Women Empowerment as proposed by Chungtia village council.

The assurance of the minister during her last visit to Sabangya came true and the village would be benefitted economically through the project, the village council chairman of Chungtia stated.

The project would run three years exclusively for women beneficiaries. The project would have different levels of silk production chain covering 300 farmers with one acre per farmer. The project would also be developed as large farming in cluster-wise by the village council, the nodal officer of the project highlighted.

He mentioned under the project tools, equipment, silk development facilities and manufacturing unit of raw materials to refine products and marketing platform would be provided to the beneficiaries.

He also mentioned that so far 150 women have been trained by scientists from Central Muga Eri Research & Training Institute in batch-wise and the remaining 150 beneficiaries would be trained in cluster-wise.

On June 7, beneficiaries who have completed their training were conferred with certificates during a formal programme at Chungtia community hall.

The nodal officer also highlighted that the objective of the project is to empower and provide livelihood to the beneficiaries of Chungtia; create awareness among the people, especially women about the sericulture activities as a vocation for livelihood; upgrading skill with appropriate technology developed by Central Silk Board on Ericulture; to train and generate income through eri spinning and weaving activities.

Imotemjen also stated the project aims to produce 37.80 MT of eri cut cocoons, 28.35 MT spun yarns and generate employment to 2500 people within three years.

He was optimistic that the project would earn good revenue for the beneficiaries with the targeted output per annum amounting to INR 486 lakhs.