High demand, soaring price make red gram growers buoyant

Gulbarga, Feb 11: Notwithstanding heavy crop loss due to scanty rainfall and pests, the soaring price and high demand for red gram have made the growers buoyant for the first time in the recent past.

Contrary to their expectations, the poor yield owing to sterility mosaic disease which caused wilting of flowers and the Rain God not being benevolent had only painted a rosy picture for the growers this year, creating high demand. Though the yield had declined by about 50 per cent, the high price and demand compensated for it.

While the Tur Board had fixed Rs 1,800 as the minimum support price per quintal of red gram, its price soared to a record Rs 2,500 to Rs 2,600, a fact that vouched for the growers' better fortunes.

The premimum quality of red gram grown in the district and the demand owing to the low yield had led to the prices sky-rocketing.

Besides, the invasion of food processing giants like ITC, Reliance India and Zuari had played a role in the prices going northwards.

The main crop cultivated in this district in the backward Hyderabad-Karnataka region, known as the ''tur bowl'', was red gram with over two lakh hectares in the district coming under the crop.

Talking to UNI here, Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Secretary H K Chandra Mohan opined that the poor yield and newly introduced 'open tendering system' had caused the sudden spurt in the red gram price. This was the peak period for red gram and about 18,000 farmers bring their produce to the yard here from Raichur, Bijapur, Bidar, Gulbarga and neighbouring Maharashtra.

Reeling out statistics, he said despite low yield, trading of red gram in the APMC market yard here exceeded last year's trading. While the arrivals last year were 4.91 lakh quintals, this year till February three it was 5.45 lakh quintals. The yard, one of the biggest in the state, had exceeded last year's tax collection of Rs 3.75 crore by registering Rs 5.14 crore till February this year.

Meanwhile, the newly introduced open tendering system in the APMC yard for red gram trading provided a transparent system, giving the farmers the choice to accept or reject the price offered by the buyers. The quotations would be opened in the presense of farmers, doing away with the traders' cartel and arresting the exploitation of growers.

An agriculture department source said the yield declined this year to about five quintals per hectare as against the normal crop of seven to eight quintals.

Expressing happiness, Eshwarappa, a farmer who brought his produce to the APMC yard for selling, said he had expected a price of Rs 1,800, but the price was now hovering around Rs 2,500.

Mr Mohan said about 75 per cent of red gram would be taken to neighbouring Tamil Nadu by the wholesale traders for processing, from where it would be distributed nationwide. ''Despite Gulbarga being known as the tur bowl, there are only about 30 small processing mills. Consequently, large quantity of the red gram is sent to Tamil Nadu for processing,'' he lamented.

He said the APMC had proposed to the Tur Board to make red gram processing units a cottage industry, using the machines developed by the Mysore-based Centre for Food Technology and Research Institute to process red gram. It would also generate self employment as the growers could sell processed red gram with their own brand name. The State Tur Board was considering the proposal, he added.

Karnataka Agriculture Marketing Board Regional Manager Ashok Kumar said the new tender system led to the buyers competing with themselves in buying the produce, resulting in the price hike. The APMC yard would introduce 'electronic tender system' this month in an effort to do away with the delay in trading and keeping the price of red gram buoyant.

UNI