Till the year 2010, a peacock box had always accompanied my dad’s Diwali bonus while my dad had always concerned about how to split the bonus money for various purchases, my brother and I had always concerned about how to split that peacock box which had separate cracker boxes inside. Being an elder one, my brother forever did the inauguration, where boxes of flower pots, chakras, poppers, sparklers, bombs will be laid down open followed by a crucial splitting. When it comes to splitting it has never been a happy story for me as there is a strategic game rule framed by my brother that never favored me in history and the rule goes like this; Within 30 seconds one has to grab as much as they can with both their hands when the timer ends whatever one posses will be their share to burst. Eventually, my brother always won a bigger share since he always had bigger hands than me.
Today thinking about Diwali arriving next month unleashed abundance of real stories within me and it has also made me to think about “what might be the story that our favorite peacock box could tell us if it can speak”. Won’t it tell us its story being born in Sivakasi, jam-packed by thousands of workers and travelled all the way to our home to brighten our festival? So let us decipher the supply chain of Sivakasi crackers to understand the value that each peacock box carried and carries.
The Location Advantage
Sivakasi, a land often hit by drought, often left with no water for agriculture potentially turned out to be an ideal location for manufacturing any fire related goods. Though it might seem to be a man made choice, the land of Sivakasi is naturally gifted with the abundance of sunlight letting it to happily cherish the cracker making and match stick making unlike any places in India. Especially, the cracker industry is so massive that it satisfies 90% of the India’s crackers demand.
The human force Advantage
After location, availability of large workforce is the next factor that gives a supplementary boost to this industry. Major works in the fire cracker production requires physical tasks which suits the people in and below the poverty line of Sivakasi to ace manufacturing without the need of any formal education.
Clubbing the two primary resources the production process begins with the procurement of raw materials which varies with each type of cracker. Like iron rod for sparklers, strings for various bomb, paper rolls for poppers etc. yet the common chemical raw material that is used is the barium nitrate which is necessary for all sparkling night burnt ones. Following the procurement the manufacturing happens in the several cottage industries which is set far from the main town area to prevent substantial damages if any accidents might occur. Drying in the next stage after manufacturing and followed by which the packing happens. Finally, the primary selling happens between the manufacturer to distributor and the secondary selling happens between manufacturer to the retailer and lastly from retailer to customer.
Current Challenges
Fire cracker industry in Sivakasi is an $800 million commerce that has been providing livelihoods to millions but in 2018 India’s cracker ban was an ultimate shock to the town which was relying on it for the next day meal. Though the ban focused on curb of air pollution the industry didn’t see it coming so soon. To bring in a win – win situation PESO (Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organization) suggested Indian government on regulating the terms on production of fire cracker which avoided harmful chemicals like barium nitrate. PESO also enforced to initiate the production of green crackers rather than the conventional one.
Green crackers require altogether a different chemical binding which causes less air pollution and the chemical mixture is yet to be proven at the labs. For Sivakasi, a town which found life out of barren land won’t see green crackers as an end but a new challenge to rise even higher than yesterday. On the other hand, Sivakasi crackers union believe that Tuticorin port with an improvement on infrastructure will be a potential place to kick start the export of their crackers to speak the story of finest handmade crackers across the globe. #Happy_learning9
-Roobaswathiny A (Amrita School of Business)
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