With the mango season coming to an end, traders say the poor arrivals of the fruit have not brought cheers to them in the district. The traders have been complaining of acute fall in yield due to some pest attack which occurred during the flowering season coinciding with Karthigai month in Tamil almanac.
Usually, June and July are peak period of sale of this fruit, although its arrival commences from mid-April every year. But this year, the arrivals are likely to decline by the last week of this month, indicating that the fruit will be scarce in July, say the wholesale dealers of Srirangam.
K. Muthukumar, another dealer at Mambala Salai, says the arrival at the auction yard at Mambaza Salai had come down to 200 bags this season against 500 bags last season. Each bag contained 50 or 75 mangoes depending upon its size. He has been selling “malgoa”, “sendura”, “rumani”, and “alphonsa” for the past one decade.
“This year saw the poorest arrival because of the withering of flowers,” he said. On an average, the yield from a tree had got reduced to just 250 kg from its previous one tonne.
Lease strategy
The wholesale dealers get the fruits from the mango groves leased by them and Melur is one of the main areas in Srirangam where the mango orchards are located in plenty.
S. Ramesh said he had leased seven mango groves with 500 trees this season for Rs. 4 lakh. He had to invest another Rs. 3 lakh on manure and fertiliser. The sudden attack by an insect which destroyed the flowers caused extensive damage to the trees. Learning from his experience last season, he immediately applied fertiliser and prevented the spread of the attack to other trees, he said.
He had harvested different fruits — “kallamani”, “imam pasanth”, “kaasa lattu”, “malgoa”, and “banganapalli”. “Never in the past six decades, we witnessed such a serious fall in the yield,” Mr. Ramesh said.
Against 200 fruits a tree last season, the yield had dwindled down to just 75. Obviously, the price had shot up. The price was Rs. 15 a kg for ‘kallamani’, Rs. 40 for ‘banganapalli’, Rs. 50 for ‘malgoa’, and Rs. 90 for “Imam Pasand”.
Natural ripening
As there was a demand for naturally-ripened fruits, he has set up a separate shed — a thatched structure, where he had stocked the produce. “Based on orders from retail dealers, I have been harvesting the mango from the trees and ripening it at this shed,” he said showing the heap of mangoes.
