Coconut growers in the region are feeling the pinch of price drop as copra procurement too plummeted for want of good price and adequate buyers. They have called upon the governmental agencies to step in and reverse the tide. With Tamil Nadu heading the table in coconut production, the problem has assumed enormous proportions.
“Nearly 95 per cent of the coconut growers in the State are small and marginal farmers. During last year, the selling price of one coconut was between Rs. 12 and Rs. 15 and that helped them to sustain. But in 2016, with the increase in coconut production, in the past five months the purchase price has plummeted to Rs. 6 a nut and that too purchasers are hard to come by,” points out president, Tamil Nadu Coconut Cultivators’ Association A. Palanivel of Peravurani in Thanjavur district. Seen against the production cost of Rs. 12 per nut, the prevailing market price has come as a blow to the producers.
Even as per the Coconut Development Board’s findings the cost of producing one coconut works out to Rs. 10 at least, he rues.
Seen in hindsight, the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) must have started procuring copra through the State Government’s TANFED since the beginning of 2016 and had that been done, the price of coconut would have been at least Rs. 7.50 and the growers’ loss would have come down. Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana states are extending subsidy in procurement price but unfortunately Tamil Nadu Government is yet to formulate such a policy. That could be of great help to us growers, Mr. Palanivel pleads with Chief Minister Jayalalithaa adding she could effectively intervene by fixing the support price at Rs. 10 per kilogram of copra. Also, the State Government could purchase and market tender coconuts and that would come in handy to the suffering growers. Besides, the coconut growers pleaded with the governments to increase the copra purchase price to Rs. 100 a kilogram for 2017, up from the current Rs. 59.50 per kilogram to help growers tide over the crisis, the Association has urged in memoranda submitted to the Central and State Governments.
It would be a great relief if the State Government extended additional support price for copra besides the minimum support price as is being done in other states.
It would be prudent for the Agricultural Pries Commission Chairman to conduct the price fixation meeting in Chennai and not in New Delhi as an overwhelming majority of the coconut production was from this region, Mr. Palanivel noted adding it would be in the interest of the Tamil Nadu growers if a State Coconut Development Board is formed.
