History of Jute
Ancient Jute
For many decades, poor villagers of India wore jute clothes. Ropes and twines used by the people of the Indian state of Bengal since ancient times are made of white jute for various household applications. Moreover, paper manufacturing companies in China have used all types of plants like jute, hemp, and cotton to make paper.
17th Century Time Period
From the 17th century to the mid-20th century, the British Empire was owned by the British East India Company, formerly the jute traders. Raw jute was traded by the British East India Company. The Acland Mill was the first jute mill established in India. The mill was established in 1855 by British entrepreneur George Acland and Bengali financier Babu Bysumber Sen in Rishra, Bengal Presidency, British India (present-day West Bengal, India). The first consignment of raw jute was exported by the East India Company in the year 1792–93. In Scotland, flax spinners were trying to find out if jute could be processed mechanically. Soon, spinners adapted their electricity-powered flax machinery to the spinning of jute thread. This resulted in increased export and production of raw jute from the Indian subcontinent, which was the sole supplier of jute.
Time since 1855
The main producing areas of jute were in Bengal towards Kolkata. When Mr. George Acland was purchasing jute spinning machinery from Dundee for India. The first power-driven weaving factory in India was established in the year 1855 at Rishra on the Hooghly River near Calcutta. By the year 1869, five mills were established with about 950 looms. The growth of jute mills was so rapid that, by the year 1910, 38 companies were running about 30,685 looms. These jute mills produced more than a billion yards of cloth and 450 million bags. By the mid-1880s, the jute industry took over almost the whole of Dundee and Calcutta. In the 19th century, jute production also started in other countries like France, America, Italy, Austria, Russia, Belgium and Germany.
The period from the 19th century to 1947
In the 19th century, the raw jute industry expanded rapidly. In the year 1939, about 68,372 looms were installed on the banks of the Hooghly River in Calcutta. The major items woven by jute are bags, which are made from fine fabrics also known as hessian or burlap. The established handlooms of Calcutta provide the place with world-class leadership in burlap and other bagging materials.
Time after the year 1947
After India’s independence, most of the jute traders started leaving India, leaving their jute mills. Most of these were being bought by Marwari traders. During the year 1947, after partition, part of the jute mills went to East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh).
The jute industry played a vital role in the economic development of Bengal. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Bengal was dependent on only one manufacturing industry – jute. The jute industry employed about half of Bengal’s total industrial workforce.
During most of the history of the jute mills, three-quarters of the workers in jute factories were non-Bengali.
Before the establishment of the first jute mill, handloom weavers used jute fiber to make twine, ropes, and coarse cloth for the poor, and also for fishing and tying ships.
The British also soon discovered ways to soften the tough and brittle nature of jute fiber by adding oil and water. This experiment made the fiber more flexible and easier to separate, resulting in a usable thread.
However several historical events were responsible for the development of the jute industry. In 1838, the Dutch government specified bags made of jute instead of flax for carrying coffee from the East Indies. However, the Crimean War of 1854–56 cut off flax supplies from Russia, and Dundee, Britain’s famous jute manufacturing center, was forced to look for alternatives.
At the same time, during the American Civil War (1861-65), the supply of American cotton was greatly restricted. The effect of this was that the jute trade got a further boost. Due to this, the demand for jute increased rapidly. In response to this, Bengali farmers tried to meet the world demand by increasing the area of jute cultivation.
The Company of Borneo established a second mill, with spinning and weaving facilities, in 1859. Unlike the Auckland Mill, it doubled the size of its plant within five years of its establishment.
These mills made huge profits between 1868 and 1873. Five new companies started in 1874 and 8 more companies started in 1875. Thus, there was a real boom in the jute industry in Bengal during the late nineteenth century.
With the establishment of jute mills, Bengal became a major producer and exporter of sacking bags. Calcutta appeared to be a strong competitor to Dundee and successfully penetrated Dundee’s Hessian market in many parts of the world, including the United States. The main reason for this was the low cost of production of jute goods by the mills of Calcutta.
Secondly, its location was close to the jute-producing districts of Bengal and Assam. Third, there was cheap labor. Fourth, the mills operated 16 to 17 hours a day, and sometimes up to 23 hours. This benefited the Calcutta manufacturers in monetary terms.
Furthermore, they were offering better quality jute. In the sixty years between 1880 and 1940, the number of mills increased 6 times, the number of looms almost 15 times, spindles 20 times, and the number of persons employed 11.5 times. The growth of the industry was significant during the 20 years following the year 1900.
After the end of the First World War, the demand for raw jute in the world decreased. This caused damage to jute cultivation areas. The situation for jute cultivation became worse during the Great Depression. The prices of jute fell so low that growing jute became uneconomical. As a result, the area under jute cultivation was much less. Economic improvement took place by 1939. The outbreak of World War II led to an increase in demand for jute between 1939 and 1945, as a result of which farmers began to use more area for jute cultivation.
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