GUWAHATI: The country's eighth tea auction centre — which is also the second in the State — was inaugurated by the Speaker of Assam Legislative Assembly, Hitendra Nath Goswami, in Jorhat on Wednesday. The other seven tea auction centres in India are located in Siliguri, Coimbatore, Coonoor, Guwahati, Jalpaiguri, Kolkata and Kochi.
Speaking on the occasion, Speaker Hitendra Nath Goswami said, "The Tea Board in association with mjunction services has launched Jorhat e-auction platform for tea today. With this the long felt need of setting up of a Tea Auction Centre at tea city Jorhat has been fulfilled. I sincerely express my gratitude to the Tea Board of India for addressing the long demand of the people of upper Assam in general and Jorhat in particular.
"On this important occasion, on behalf of people of Jorhat, I sincerely express my gratitude to the Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal for his persuasion and perseverance in the entire process. My sincere thanks also go to the Member of Parliament Kamakhya Prasad Tasa and former Vice Chairman of Tea Board, Bidyananda Barkakoty for their untiring contribution to transform the dream of the people of Jorhat into the reality."
While the Jorhat e-auction platform is an initiative of Tea Board, the implementing agency is mjunction services, which is India's largest B2B eCommerce company. It also runs the world's largest eMarketplace for steel. It is a 50:50 venture promoted by SAIL and Tata Steel.
Assam produces about 716 million kg of tea annually which is 52% of the country's tea. The six contiguous districts of Assam produces about 450 million kg of tea annually – Golaghat, Jorhat, Sivasagar, Charaideo, Dibrugarh and Tinsukia.
The first tea auction centre in Assam was set-up at Guwahati in the year 1970. In these last 50 years, tea production of Assam increased three times. Hence, the people of upper Assam and particularly the three Assam-based tea associations — ATPA, NETA and BCP — demanded a new-age auction centre at Jorhat, stated a release.