High moisture content in ragi crop, the mainstay of farmers in Bargur hills, has dashed all their hopes for economic emancipation, after successive droughts for two years.
Helped by favourable monsoon, farmers, most of them in heavy debts, cultivated the crop with enormous eagerness. But, untimely rain last month drenched the harvested crops left by farmers on the field to dry. In very many fields, even sprouts had appeared, according to Ganesan, a cultivator who had also suffered heavy loss.
Sadly for them, the damage to the ragi crop happened at a time when it commanded a price of Rs. 2,500 for a 100 kg bag, considered remunerative by farmers. Letting harvested ragi crop to dry on the fields has been a traditional practice. Farmers stock the dried plants at their homes and carry out need-based threshing for their self-consumption over the year. Ragi, the only source of nutrition for the tribal people, is cultivated in over 1,600 hectares on the Bargur hills, and nearly half of the harvested crop suffered damage due to the untimely rain, farmers say.
Official sources said the extent of damaged crop was much lesser, citing a spot assessment carried out by a team of senior officials recently following representations by affected farmers to the district administration for relief.
Officials acknowledge the problems caused by untimely rain, but maintain that the loss is not much. Not all farmers who had left the harvested ragi plants on the fields. Most of them had taken the crop home and safeguarded the plants from the rain, according to official sources.
The productivity was good and the farmers were initiated into sowing high-yielding varieties under the Millet Mission Scheme that entails provision of attractive subsidy and supply of bio fertilizers, the sources said.
Nevertheless, ragi cultivators who had suffered losses need to be identified and compensated suitably for sustaining their future dependence on agriculture for survival, local farmers emphasise.
Officials say loss is not much
Farmers seek compensation
