New Delhi: The ripples of thewar in West Asia are being felt on Maharashtra’s banana trade. It has created a crisis of sorts as farmers across state’s
major banana growing regions are being forced to abandon or destroy their own crops, as per a report in The Indian Express.
In districts like Jalgaon and Solapur, where most of the banana in the state is grown, the season began on a promising note. But, everything went haywire after the war started. Currently, a number of containers of banana remain stuck in cold storage, unable to move because of export disruptions to the Middle East.
As shipments are stalled, stocks of bananas meant for international markets like the UAE, Iraq and Iran are being redirected to the already saturated domestic market, causing prices to fall steeply.
From Rs 22 per kg to Rs 2 per kg
Earlier, in February, farmers were getting between Rs 18 and Rs 22 per kg. However, by March, this fell to Rs 8-10 per kg. And in April, they went down to just Rs 2-3 per kg.
A farmer from Karmala in Solapur district, who has 10 acres under banana cultivation, told Indian Express that he put in around Rs 20 lakh last year on fertilisers, drip irrigation, and other inputs. “The highest rate I got was Rs 22 per kg in February. But as the war started and exports were curbed, harvest across the state got diverted to the domestic market and prices crashed,” he was quoted as saying. With current prices at Rs 2-3 per kg, the farmer feels that he will able to recover just Rs 2.5-3 lakh.
Moving towards sugarcane
The human toll of the crisis is huge as well. Recently, a farmer from Karmala allegedly died by suicide, after a trader took his produce, failed to export it, and did not make any payment to him. Farmers have taken debts from moneylenders, but their earning has nosedived, driving them to take their own lives. Some farmers are planning to switch to sugarcane, because they think they “cannot rely entirely on bananas anymore with the market unreliability”.
A farmer in Baramati said the economics no longer make any sense. He pointed out that the prices are too low to even recover the cost of transport and labour. He is planning to destroy the plantation and got for sugarcane. The farmer said that while in retail, consumers pay Rs 50-60 per kg, farm-gate prices have plummeted. “Traders should pay us a fair price so that we can at least survive,” he was quoted by Indian Express as saying.
A banana farmer from Jalgaon said the cost of cultivation and other inputs are rapidly spiking, but the income has gone down sharply. Many farmers are unable to repay the debts taken and are on the verge of abandoning their fields.
In many areas, harvesting operations are facing disruptions. Banana containers are stranded in cold storage and there’s no scope for export. The report says farmers in parts of Solapur are using rotavators to plough their standing banana crops back into the soil. They are doing this to turn their plantations into manure instead of selling the produce at a massive loss in the domestic market.
