C-Natural Indigo-Dye Extraction

Introduction

Natural indigo dye is extracted from the legume plant Indigofera tinctoria. The process involves over night fermentation of harvested indigo plant using bacteria in specially designed cement moulded ring tank. After fermentation the plant debris are removed and the ferment liquid is oxidised using specially designed mechanical agitator. The precipitated indigo settles down at the bottom of the tank as slurry is collected, boiled and sun dried as indigo cake.

Application/Use

The technology is apt for waste land development. This can be taken up by women entrepreneurs and small farmers in collective cooperative set up. This can also be taken up in large scale plantation for industrial application.

Advantages

The technology involves upgradation of traditional rural craft by application of microbial biotechnology and simplified the process by engineerial design. So there is increase in yield and quality is also improved to great extent. The product natural dye would meet the market demand arising due to banning of synthetic and hazardous chemical dyes in the world market.

Production Capacity

10 Kgs Indigo per day

Inputs Required

Building	Indigo tank
Land	10 acres
Water	10,000 lts
Power/fuel	Manual labour
Other utilities	Mechanical agitator
Manpower Reqd
Total	15
Technicians	2
Skilled	3
Unskilled	10(Women)

Transfer Forms

Know-how

For further information please contact

Asian and Pacific Centre for Transfer of Technology
P O Box 4575
Qutab Institutional Area
New Delhi - 110 016, India
Tel : +91-(0)11-6856276
Fax : +91-(0)11-6856274
Email: rvijh@apctt.org