The Desheeya Karshaka Samajam has urged the Agriculture Minister to set up units to process mango and tomato at Muthalamada.
In a memorandum to the Minister on Tuesday, the samajam said mango was cultivated in 3,000 hectares at Muthalamada, Kollengode, and the nearby grama panchayats of Chittur taluk by more than 2,500 farmers. More farmers were taking up mango cultivation in the district.
But the farmers were not getting a remunerative price as they were exploited by traders and middlemen who purchased mango at the flowering stage itself.
The farmers did not have a facility to scientifically ripen, pack, and export their produce. If a factory for processing and packing was set up, the farmers could export them directly and get better price, the memorandum said.
During the last two seasons, because of climate change, the production of mango declined affecting the farmers at Muthalamada. Muthalamada is famous in the international market for the early availability of mango. Ripe mango is available from January as mango trees flower early here.
As they are the first to reach ripe mango in the market, the farmers used to get a good price. But during the last two years, the availability of mango was delayed by two months affecting the prospects of the farmers, samajam president V. Vasudevan and general secretary Muthalamthode Mani said.
They said mango worth Rs.300 crore was exported from Muthalamada every year. So a modern processing unit in the public sector would be of help to farmers. The mango varieties of Muthalamada were in demand in the world market, with the annual production estimated at 35,000 tonnes.
Mango varieties such as Alphonso, Malgova, Sindhooram, Kalapadi, and Banganapilly are cultivated here.
A mango exporter M. Haneefa said during the last two seasons there was unseasonal rain in November and December. Late flowering and the resultant delay in harvest had deprived the farmers of the early bird advantage.
“Mango cultivation and export have to go high-tech in sorting, grading, ripening, packing, and exporting for fetching good price in the international market,” he said.
Since individual farmers were not able to set up these facilities because of the high cost, government agencies must help the farmers, the memorandum said.
The memorandum also urged the government to set up a tomato processing unit along with the mango factory as a large number of farmers were cultivating tomato in Chittur taluk.
During the season, the price of tomato usually crashed and farmers were forced abandon the crop. Thus thousands of tonnes of the produce went waste putting strain on the finances of farmers.
