Upgradation of Jute Retting by Pectinolytic Bacteria at Farmers' Level for the Improvement of Fibre Quality

Abstract

Fourteen bacterial colonies have been isolated from jute retting bacterial collections from farmers' retting tanks in the districts of Rajshahi and Pabna. Out of these fourteen bacterial colonies only three are found to be pectinolytic and non-cellulolytic. They grow moderate in Nutrient agar medium and well in Echandi medium containing Apple pectin as a source of carbon. These three bacterial strains are named by Z1, Z4 and Z3o and are identified as Micro-coccus Lyle,M. lute us and Macro-bacterium laevaniformans, respectively. In field trials pretreatment with single or mixed culture of Z1, Z4 and Z30 on basal portions of green jute resulted in removing cuttings from jute. In Tossa jute removal of cuttings are made from 1.72 inches to 0.4 - 0.33 inches and in Deshi jute from 5.8 inches to 2.0 inches. Tensile strength, fineness and color of jute fiber are also improved. These result in up gradation of jute by one to two grades over the control.