Silk and Bangladesh :  

A Brief Historical Review Sericulture under British Rule

The sericulture industry of Bengal (a part of which now constitutes Bangladesh) has a glorious heritage, reference of which may be traced back to the ancient epic literature and documents.

As it has been noted by famous travelers and historians sericulture industry in this part of the sub-continent during the period of Great Moghuls was a prosperous industry.1 At the end of the 17th century when the British East India Company established itself in India, the period of decline of silk weaving in Bengal began. The Company assuming the Dewany of Bengal Presidency introduced new feature in the silk export policy which manifested in the increase of raw silk at the cost of silk manufactures. Submitting to the interest of the British textile industrialists this was consciously engineered so as to meet the big potential increase in the demand for raw silk in Great Britain (created mainly due to the introduction of power driven machines), to protect its own manufactured silk products from competition and to capture the entire market for textile products in Bengal. In pursuing this interest the Company undertook various measures to destroy the silk weaving industry in India, and particularly in Bengal. In many cases the Company people went to the extent of forcibly chopping off the thumbs (the finger which is one of the most essential organs in hand weaving) of the weavers. Consequently, during the British rule over India, mulberry as a cash crop resorted to a much less important position in comparison to indigo, tea or opium.

However, increase in export of raw silk necessitated enhanced mulberry cultivation as well as quality improvement of raw silk. Thus, all the subsequent measures taken by the British Raj for the development of sericulture and silk sector were directed towards this.

However, in comparison to the efforts and supports necessary to rejuvenate the sericulture sector of Bengal, these attempts were inadequate and could not bring tangible results. Moreover, the general policy thrust of the colonial power was in contradiction to the greater interest of the growers, sector as well as the country. The picture of decline of the Bengal’s sericulture may be well illustrated by the example of Rajshahi District. In 1876 the District’s average annual production of raw silk was 409,970 lbs (Siddiqi : 1976). But from the beginning of the twentieth century the production of raw silk marked a steady decline and by 1911 it amounted to only 23,000 lbs (lbid). On the eve of the partition of India in 1947 the industry was on the verge of extinction producing little more than 100 lbs only in a few village of the Rajshahi District (Feldmam : 1978).

Development of Sericulture during the Pakistan Period

While the sericulture and silk industry of Bengal was almost at its a lowest ebb the partition of India took place in 1947 and Pakistan with its wings emerged as an independent nation. During the British period the silk growing areas of Bengal, which fell into the share of the then East Pakistan used mainly to cater to the silk manufacturing enterprises located in Malda and Murshidabad, which remained with India. As a result, East Pakistan just after the partition was left with practically nothing in the form of silk processing machinery and appliances. In this respect the only exception were the two nurseries, which were also at a very deplorable state, located one at Bogra and the other at Mirganj, Rajshahi.3 accordingly, in spite of the fact that most of the silk growing areas of East Pakistan were adjacent to India and there were silk processing units on the other side of the border appearance of new international boundary line and other political realities deprived the sericulture sector of the new state at its intial stage to take advantage of previous economic integration. One added problem was that the expert rearers, reelers and weavers were predominantly Hindus and they migrated to India after the partition leaving behind a vacuum of skilled technical hands. Thus, we find that in the early days of the Pakistan period the sericulture sector of the then East Pakistan faced to a moribund characterized by inability of the cocoon producers to dispose of their products, total absence of silk processing industry, obsolete nurseries as well as inadequate institutional infrastructure and acute shortage of skilled labour. Obviously it put the government of the day to the hard task developing the sector merely from a scratch.

However, the overall policy environment prevailing in the country at that time when the small and cottage industry sector in general and sericulture in particular had to pursue their development was not much favorable.

Thus, although some development schemes which included setting up of 10 new nurseries, 22 extension centers, the Silk Research Institute, and the Rajshahi Silk Factory were sanctioned during this period (1947-71), what was lacking was a whole-hearted effort in tapping the potentials of sericulture and providing adequate to the producers for the exploitation of such potentials. In this respect the two policies of the then Central Government that contributed most to impede the development of sericulture were, first, appropriate tariff and financial protections were not given to this handicapped industry and second, licences for import of raw silk were liberally sanctioned.

The Post Independence Period

During the post independence period, the received comparatively focused attention in terms of investment, operational policy formulation, and institution building. Reflections of understanding of the importance of silk sector, as comprehended by the successive political regimes, may be found in various national plan documents. Immediately after the independence, one of the major policy measures with respect to the silk sector of the country was imposing restrictions over the import of silk yarn and silk fabrics. This step obviously provided much awaited protection to the sericulture sector. The promotional measures undertaken were attempted to be integrated in the overall policy framework for the sector and institutional arrangements were made to implement these policies. Creation of the Bangladesh Sericulture Board (BSB), an autonomous, statutory body responsible for all-round development of the sector, in December 1977 wad a big step forward in this direction.

At present, besides BSB, a number of other government, semi-government, and non-government organizations and agencies, including local and expatriate, are engaged directly or indirectly in promoting sericulture industry in Bangladesh. The number of public bodies involved at the national level is about ten, whereas the number of private bodies (national and international) stands at about fifteen. In addition to these, more than 400 different types of organizations/agencies at the village level are pursuing sericulture schemes. Moreover, there are more than 40 seri-producers’ cooperatives scattered all over the silk producing regions.
However, in the filed of sericulture development, BSB remains to  be the lead institution performing the role of catalytic agent. Though its various programmes and projects BSB is providing three dimensional services, viz, stimulatory, supportive and sustaining, pervading, all the four stages of sericulture production.

 Trends in Output and Employment (Before silk Development Project) 

A detailed evaluation of the performance of the sector and the contribution of various policies and institutions will be taken up in the following chapters. If one takes a look at the broad parameters, however, one cannot avoid drawing the conclusion that the overall progress of the sector has been far from encouraging. There was an initial upsurge in the level of production with the initiation of various development programmes under BSB. But the growth rate could not be sustained in the later years. In 1977/78 total area under mulberry- plantation was 405.81 hectares and most of it was of bush type plantation.1 In the initial years, bush plantation expanded fairly rapidly. However, after a few years people started uprooting bush plantation for diverse reasons and some switched to tree plantation. Between 1977 and 1985 a total of more than 1,371 hectares of land were put under bush plantation. Of this only 599.40 hectares were retained. In 1984/85, total area under mulberry plantation was 1,445.85 hectares which fell far short of the Second Five Year Plan targeted area of 2,986 hectares. Of the existing mulberry area in 1984/85, 41 per cent was under bush plantation and the rest was under tree plantation.
Cocoon production jumped from 227 metric ton in 1977/78 to 401 metric ton in 1979/80. Subsequently, for two years it remained stagnant figuring little above 400 metric ton. The cocoon production level fell to 393 metric ton in 1984/85 due to crop failure. In 1985/86 it rose somewhat (465 metric ton) but remained far below the target set in Second Five Year Plan (2,750 metric ton).
From agro-climatic point of view it is possible to grow host plants and rear silk worms in every part of the country except the southern most coastal part. Accordingly, one of the aims of the development programmes was to expand silk production beyond the traditional silk areas of the country. But more than 60 per cent of the total cocoon is still produced in 29 village spread over 2 unions in the Bholahat upazila- a traditional silk producing area of the country located in the north-eastern part under the (old) district of Rajshahi. In some of the new areas such as Bogra where satisfactory initial expansion took place, production shrunk back to near zero level in the later years. In terms of productivity also the performance has been unsatisfactory. Per hectares production of cocoon has remained far below the international standard. This is primarily because of low use of HYV plants and worms. Per hectares leaf production in Bangladesh is about 20 metric ton per year. In contrast, in the tropical parts of India under intensive cultivation practices about 30 ton of leaf per hectare is harvested in a year. Similarly, the local variety silkworm reared extensively in Bangladesh yields about 20 kg per 100 disease free layings (DFLs) as opposed to 35 kg per 100 DFL in the case of improved varieties. Total yarn production in the country in 1985/86 stood at around 29 thousand kg as opposed to the SFYP target of 172 thousand kg. Yarn production dose not seem to have increased discernibly during the past few years. Starting from an annual production level of 25 thousand kg in 1979/80 it gradually rose to 34 thousand kg in 1983/84 and then declined to 24 thousand kg in 1984/85. About 86 per cent of the yarn id reeled in the private sector using traditional cottage reeling device called katghai. The yarn reeled in katghai is considered to be of inferior quality compared to machine reeled yarn. Cocoon requirement per kg of yarn reeled varies from 13 to 18 kg in Bangladesh as opposed to 5 kg in Japan, 8 kg in Korea, and 12 kg in India.
Silk weaving is also done in both private and public sectors. An estimated 1.16 million meters of silk fabric were woven in the country in 1985/86 of which 96 per cent came from private sector handloom units and the rest from the public sector. The production level of 1985/86 fell far short of the SFYP target output of 2.77 million meters.
There has been some modest increase in the employment level in the silk sector over time. But the absolute size of the labour force involved in the activity has been negligible. It is estimated that about 25 to 30 thousand persons had direct employment in the sector in 1985/86 which accounted for less than 2 per cent of the lobour force involved in the small and cottage industries sector in the country. Of the total employment, about 63 per cent were employed in the pre-reeling stage, 2 per cent in reeling, 30 per cent in weaving, and the rest 5 per cent were in the public sector.

Performance under Silk Development Project

Bangladesh Silk Foundation started operation as a stakeholder (government, NGOs, rearers, reelers, weavers, researcher, credit institutions, and private manufacturers) representative entity with main responsibilities being promotion of client focused research, extension and training, product development and market promotion and coordination between various organizations related with sericulture. In implementing the SDP, Silk Foundation initiated formation of strategic alliances between the stakeholders to coordinate research, training and extension activities, which are essential for the silk sector to take off from its existing stagnancy. Prime objective of the SDP was to justify whether Bangladesh has comparative advantage in silk cocoon and silk production and it is economically viable. The performance of SDP is considered upon its economic and social impact on the sericulture farmers. 

Economic and social impact of SDP:

Cocoon Productivity

Income from rearing

• The project target was to raise daily income from rearing 100 DFL from Tk. 18 to Tk. 70.
• The daily average income increased to be Tk. 62 in 1997 prices.

Employment Impact

• DFL supplied by BSF supported new employment of about 0.15 million person-days in 2001-02, which was about 12% of the targeted employment of 1.23 million person-days.

Impact on production efficiency

• The SDP envisaged bringing down DRC in rearing from 2.18 to 0.77. The sample survey estimated current DRC in rearing to be 0.48.
• In the case of reeling, the project target was to bring down DRC from 3.72 to 0.59. The sample survey estimated DRC in reeling to be 1.44

Impact on NGOs

• BSF interventions have had a generally positive effect on NGO sericulture program budget, staff size (both specialists and extension workers) and number of beneficiaries.

Impact on women’s empowerment

• Silk production with the support of BSF provides poor rural women with self employment and some income, allowing increased consumption on food, clothing and house repair, and generating limited savings.

 Bangladesh Sericulture Statistics 2004- 05




Bangladesh Sericulture Statistics 2004- 05
Mulberry area coverage (ha)	5,238.38
No. of Silkworm rearers	13,998
Dfls reared (Nos. in Lakh)	14.80
Cocoon production (M.Ton)	518.44
Cocoon productivity (Kg/100 dfls)	35.03
No. of Spinners	9,435
Raw silk/ silk yarn production (M.Tons)  (mainly spun  & Dupion silk)	51.84
No. of Silk Factories	80
No. of Silk Hand looms	10,000
No. of Silk Power looms	1,272
Silk Fabric Production capacity (Lakh meter/annum)	594.80
Actual Silk Fabric production (Lakh Meter)	524.81
Current price of Bangladeshi raw silk/ silk yarn (USD/ kg)	$ 25.7- 28.5