Nagpur: Following liberalization of bamboo from forest to agriculture crop, the state government has decided to boost it into an import substitute industry.At the first Bamboo Investment Summit at Mumbai on Tuesday, jointly held by the association of Maharashtra Bamboo Development Board (MBDB), FDCM, Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and Indian Federation of Green Energy (IFGE), state forest minister Sudhir Mungantiwar said, “Bamboo has potential to create wealth from paper, pulp and fabrics.”“India’s emerging industry has potential to match China’s $29 billion bamboo industry,” said principal secretary (forest) Vikas Kharge.The summit saw presence of over 200 stakeholders including farmers, processors, industrialists and NGOs working in the field of promoting bamboo.Drawing a parallel of bamboo with precious metals, the minister said, “We are offering tissue culture bamboo saplings at Rs10 to the farmers with government contributing Rs15, that will start giving remunerative returns after six years and attract capital market’s attention in wealth sector.To boost bamboo cultivation and sustainable supply, the Forest Development Corporation of Maharashtra (FDCM) is also planning to take up tissue culture bamboo plantation on turnkey or sharing basis with private partners for supplying biomass of bamboo for industrial uses like production of ethanol, bio CNG etc“We are even ready to help as service providers to interested farmers and parties with minimum 25 acres of commercial plantation project,” said N Rambabu, managing director of FDCM.MBDB managing director TSK Reddy said, “The basic idea of the summit was to go before the industries and tell them that bamboo is not confined to making handicrafts or building shamiana but timber, charcoal, biofuels etc.”

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