Ginger rates fall suddenly

Ginger rates fall suddenly
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Highlights

With ginger rates suddenly falling, farmers are forced to sell, with no buyers, at Rs.10 to Rs.12 a kg from a once high of Rs.70. As such, they are seeking market facility to sell the commodity. 

Adilabad: With ginger rates suddenly falling, farmers are forced to sell, with no buyers, at Rs.10 to Rs.12 a kg from a once high of Rs.70. As such, they are seeking market facility to sell the commodity.

About 300 farmers are agitated over the steep fall in the price. They had taken up ginger cultivation in 200 acres in Gudihatnur, Indravelli, Thamsi, Talamadugu, Jainadh, Ichchoda mandals and in 100 acres in Nirmal, Bhainsa, Lakshmanchanda, Sarangapur mandals. They had raised it in Chennur, Dandpalli and Jannaram instead of turmeric with the hope of securing high profits.

However, when the crop was ready, the rates fell because of lack of purchasers, a worried ryot Kranti Yadav of Danora village in Bheem mandal told The Hans India on Friday, while pointing out, along with Govardhan, that the rate was never so low in the past. He had raised ginger on two acres of land spending Rs.2 lakh.

With the drastic fall in the prices, farmers like him are incurring huge losses and facing a crisis. They are claiming a loss of Rs.50,000 per acre. In the absence of cold storage facilities, they are forced to sell at a low price to get rid of piled up stocks.

A Girijan, Vilas, of Rampur village in Indravelli mandal has been cultivating ginger in the last three years. This year, he took it up on five acres. With the price fall, he is a worried man, as sending the yield to Nagpur got him a rate of Rs.1,000 to Rs.1,200 per quintal, failing to even fetch the transport charges.

With farmers selling at Rs.10 a kg, middlemen are exploiting the fall in prices to their benefit making a killing by selling at higher price. A farmer, Boranna, said that the Horticulture Department appears least concerned about their plight. He wants the department to provide market support to prevent exploitation by brokers.

Horticulture officer Narsimha Rao, while conceding to The Hans India that ginger farmers were indeed facing hardship, asserted that the department could not provide market support to them.

However, he gave them hope by stating that the rates could go up in two months. Rao suggested that farmers should wait for the right price. The department would try to set up cold storage facility, or providing loans if farmers opt for it, he stated.

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