Flower growers in Himachal Pradesh are staring at heavy losses on account of no buyers and lack of transportation amid the coronavirus lockdown.
Baldev Dhiman, a grower at Kalhali, a village near Shimla, who cultivates flowers in around 3,500 sq.m., desperately wants the lockdown to end as the peak season is running out.
“The season is at its peak now but there are no buyers. Traders are not placing any orders with us as they say there’s no demand in the market. Besides, due to the lockdown the transportation has come to a halt and there’s no way I can transport flowers,” he told The Hindu over phone.
“Hotels, offices, marriage halls..everything is closed and so the demand has dropped significantly. I cultivate carnation flowers but now I am left with no choice but to feed them to cattle. Even cattle hardly eat them,” said Mr. Dhiman. He said the last consignment he had sent for delivery was on March 22, two days before the announcement of the lockdown.
“On March 24, when the lockdown was announced I had prepared a consignment of 10,000 flower bunches [20 flowers in one bunch], which was to be sent to the wholesale Ghazipur flower market, but I had to destroy it all and since then there had been no orders,” he said. “Last year during this season [March-April] I had a business of around ₹5 lakh.”
Mr. Dhiman said around 25 families are actively into flower cultivation in many villages. They are associated with the “The Maloothi Fruits Flowers and Vegetable Growers Mkt Co-op Society Ltd. Every farmer here is running into loss.”
Mr. Dhiman said he is not hopeful that the business is going to revive anytime soon and hence he has appealed to the State government to financially compensate the flower growers.
Kuldeep Thakur in Mahog village of the Solan district said the business has taken a severe blow and flowers such as carnation and lilies are rotting in the farms.
Harish Chauhan, president of the Himachal Pradesh Fruit, Vegetables and Flowers Growers Association (HPFVFGA), said the flower cultivation is primarily being done in Solan, Shimla, Bilaspur and Hamirpur districts and the situation of floriculturists is similar in all the places.
“Floriculturists are at a complete loss in the current situation. There’s no buyer, no transportation. Flowers are perishable. The annual business of flower-related activities is around ₹500 crore in the State and in the current scenario I am afraid, floriculturists could incur a loss of ₹200 crore,” said Mr. Chauhan. “Most floriculturists in the hill State grow flowers in poly-houses, for which a majority take loans. The government should take steps to financially help them now.”
