Lockdown restrictions, dearth of workers, threat of village chieftains, and low price for ginger rhizomeshave put thousands of Kerala farmers who have been cultivating ginger on rented land in Karnataka in a fix.
Usually, this is the time to apply the first dose of fertilizer to one-and-a-half-month-old ginger plants but 95% of the farmers have not even started to plant ginger rhizomes owing to the crisis. This is also the time to harvest ginger rhizomes.
“As the lease period of land will end by the end of May, the farmers are forced to harvest it before the date. Otherwise, they have to pay a huge amount to the owners to renew the lease,” Navrang Mohanan, general secretary, Kerala Ginger Growers’ Association, (KGGA), told The Hindu .
Huge loss
“If land owners disagree to renew the lease period, such a situation will cause huge loss to the farmers,” Mr. Mohanan said.
“Earlier, we depended on tribal workers in Wayanad for the cultivation, but many farmers are now engaging workers in Karnataka for the purpose. But now village chieftains threaten the workers, especially those in the southern districts of Karnataka, that they would be ostracised if they work on the lands of Kerala farmers,” he said.
They believed that the farmers spread the COVID-19 pandemic in Karnataka since the disease was first reported in Kerala, he added.
“The police have asked us to stop all farming work in the wake of the lockdown,” V.V. Jose, president of the organisation, said. Each farmer had spent more than ₹4.5 lakh per acre for fresh cultivation, including rent of the land, Mr. Jose said.
The area of ginger cultivation had increased nearly threefold this season because of good prices for the past two years, Mr. Mohanan said, adding that about 50,000 farmers had prepared land in Karnataka for ginger cultivation on nearly 1,50,000 hectares of land this season.
