Cotton farmers up in arms against seed companies

• Ryots complain that BT 2 cotton seeds are vulnerable to ‘pink bollworm’ contrary to the claims that they are pest-resistant

Hyderabad: Farmers, representatives and farmers associations are up in arms against the cotton seed production companies for taking them for a ride. Expressing their opinions at an interactive session on cotton prices regulation and related issues held here on Saturday, they demanded that the Center take steps to regulate the prices of cotton seeds and opposed payment of royalty to cotton seed production companies like Monsanto.

The meeting, attended by cotton farmers from Adilabad, Karimnagar, Warangal and Khammam, expressed concern over the heavy losses due to sowing of BT 2 cotton seeds. Exhibiting the cotton bolls which they had brought from the their fields, farmers argued that seed production companies like Monsanto had been charging high prices for BT 2 cotton seeds.

"The companies have been justifying the high price tag of BT 2 cotton seeds claiming that they are pest-resistant. However, it was nothing but a lie as the cotton bolls turned out to be vulnerable. They are getting infected by the pink bollworm," they pointed out.

Leaders of farmers’ wings of several political parties argued that the pink bollworm which originated in Gujarat had spread to other parts of the country. And, this had been proved by the Cotton Research Institute at Nagpur and further supported by the decision taken by the Andhra Pradesh government. Hence, there was no need to pay royalty to the cotton seed production companies, they said.

Further, the companies had been jacking up the cotton seed production costs to charge more from farmers. “They are showing increasing cost of packaging and transportation as reasons for rise in the seed prices. There is no point in paying royalty to these seed production companies," the farmer’s leaders said.

The meeting was organised by Bharatiya Kisan Morcha National General Secretary Sugunakara Rao, a farmer member of a Centre-appointed committee on the study of regulation of cotton seed prices. Speaking on the occasion, Rao said the meetings were meant to take stock of the opinions of the farmers and people from various walks of life on cotton seed prices, and the woes of farmers associated with the same.

The views expressed by famers would be placed for a comprehensive discussion by the Centre-appointed committee. And, he promised that their views would find place in the Centre’s proposed new law on regulation of cotton seed prices to prevent farmers from incurring loss.

He said that similar meetings were also planned in Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra to take stock of the views of farmers. The Centre-appointed committee is headed by the Telangana State and Maharashtra Agriculture Principal Secretaries, besides eight senior officials of agriculture from various states.

The meeting was attended by Congress Kisan Cell leader M Kodanda Reddy, CPI (M) Rythu Sangam National vice-president S Malla Reddy , Bharatiya Kisan Sangh general secretary Sridhar Reddy, Kisan Morcha state president Madhusudhan Reddy, Telugu Rythu president Prathap Reddy , Handlooms Corporation president Narasimha Reddy, Farmer Seeds Protection Forum convenor A Prasada Rao have participated in the meeting.