Karnataka: Price of coconut plummets; surplus supply of crop blamed

MYSURU: Price of coconut having plummeted on the wholesale market, farmers engaged in the cultivation of this quintessentially tropical crop in Mysuru and Chamarajanagar are a rather perturbed lot. The anguished farmers have appealed to the government to take cognisance of the problem, and alleviate their plight. The wholesale price of coconut crashed from Rs 40/kg until a few weeks ago to Rs 20/kg, much to the dismay of the farmers.
In Chamarajanagar district alone, coconut is cultivated across 13,200 hectares, while nearly 16,000 hectares in neighbouring Mysuru is dedicated for growing coconut. Given that the crop is the source of subsistence for thousands of farmers across the two districts, the crash in its wholesale price has raised the hackles of all stakeholders in the agriculture sector.
As is the case with many crops, the fluctuations in the wholesale price of which have little bearing on the retail cost, the rate of coconut on the retail market appears not to have been impacted by the steep fall in its wholesale price. Each coconut is being sold for anywhere between Rs 20 and Rs 30 to customers in towns and cities.
The Deepavali festivities have occasioned a spike in the demand for coconut, which is a vital ingredient in most of the delicacies prepared as part of the festive feast, pushing the retail price up. However, the demand for the husk which the shells are shorn of has crashed, adding to the woes of the farmers. Chamarajanagar Coconut Growers’ Marketing Federation, which purchases the crop for its processing unit, is procuring a very limited number of coconuts from the farmers, who have laid the blame for the crash in wholesale prices on middlemen.
Deputy director of the department of horticulture, Mysuru, BT Rudresh attributed the crash in the wholesale price of coconut to surplus harvest of the crop, not only in Mysuru and Chamarajanagar, but in neighbouring states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Andhra Pradesh. “But we are confident of the price stabilising in the near future,” Rudresh told TOI.
Former president of Chamarajanagar Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee, BK Ravikumar, a coconut cultivator himself, urged the government to lend a hand to the distressed farmers bearing the brunt of the fall in the wholesale price of the horticulture crop. “The Union government has set Rs 2,860/quintal as the minimum support price for coconut, and the state government must now take steps to ensure that APMCs procure our crop by offering at least this price, which will provide some relief to the farmers,” said Ravikumar, appealing to the government to include coconuts under the ambit of the crops to which the Fasal Bima Crop Insurance was extended.