Farmers rue delay in opening of paddy storage facilities

  • | Sunday | 8th July, 2018

“I sold paddy in June and got Rs 72,000 for the Rs 45,000 spent. In the first phase, online registrations of farmers and quality checks of paddy will be done. Had facilities been opened in May, farmers could have stored the grains and got a better price.Paddy was cultivated in 7,867 hectares in Mysuru district and 3,83,350 quintals of paddy were harvested. Mysuru: With the government not making storage facilities available to farmers in May, farmers in Mysuru district have been in the lurch as over 90% of paddy has already been harvested.Forced to sell their produce, farmers are forced to go with the rate offered by middlemen . With over 90% of paddy already sold by farmers, the government is now opening storage facilities and procurement centres in July but this offers little respite for farmers.Lamenting the delay, farmer leader Badagalapura Nagendra said, “Farmers would have benefited had the centres been opened in May last week or June first week.

Mysuru: With the government not making storage facilities available to farmers in May, farmers in Mysuru district have been in the lurch as over 90% of paddy has already been harvested.Forced to sell their produce, farmers are forced to go with the rate offered by middlemen . Had facilities been opened in May, farmers could have stored the grains and got a better price.Paddy was cultivated in 7,867 hectares in Mysuru district and 3,83,350 quintals of paddy were harvested. With over 90% of paddy already sold by farmers, the government is now opening storage facilities and procurement centres in July but this offers little respite for farmers.Lamenting the delay, farmer leader Badagalapura Nagendra said, “Farmers would have benefited had the centres been opened in May last week or June first week. We could have stored the paddy and sold it when the market seemed promising but unfortunately, we had to go with the paltry sum fixed by middlemen.”He added, “If we had been able to store our produce, we could have availed of loans, cleared debts and covered our costs.”Within a month, middlemen are making a profit between Rs300 and Rs 350 per quintal while procuring paddy from farmers for Rs 1,000-1,200 per quintal, rued Nagendra.Cultivating paddy on a 3-acre plot by spending Rs 45,000 did not give returns expected by Basavalingappa, a farmer of Gejjiganahalli village near Nanjangud. “I sold paddy in June and got Rs 72,000 for the Rs 45,000 spent. Had the storage facility opened in time, farmers in our region could have made at least Rs 500 more per quintal,” he said.While paddy has not been entirely harvested at T Narsipur, it’s not the case with Naganahalli near Srirangapatna where over 90% of farmers have harvested the crop. “Since we harvested in May and June, we had to sell it as we couldn’t store it at home. Naganahalli has around 2,000 acres under paddy cultivation and all farmers have sold their produce to middlemen for around Rs 1000 to Rs 1,200.”He said: “The government expects us to fill paddy in 50kg bags which cost Rs 20 each. We have to employ a labourer to stitch the bags which adds to the cost. They fix a different rate for dry and wet paddy. If it’s dry, we get the rate fixed by them, if the paddy is wet, it’s procured at a lesser rate.”Kumar, a farmer from Koodanahalli who cultivated paddy on a 1-acre plot, said, “If the government opens the centres during May-June, farmers will benefit. I had to sell paddy for Rs 1,060 per quintal which was barely a break-even price.”Assuring farmers that the storage facility and procurement centres are open, K Rameshwarappa, deputy director of food and civil supplies department, said: “They were opened on July 1. In the first phase, online registrations of farmers and quality checks of paddy will be done. We’ll procure paddy based on first come, first served.”- Shivendra Urs

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