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Distress sale at Nizamabad market yard
The maize, soya bean and paddy farmers have been at the receiving end because of the unseasonal rains, lack of support price for their produce, absence of intervention from government in addition to traders forming a syndicate.
Nizamabad: The maize, soya bean and paddy farmers have been at the receiving end because of the unseasonal rains, lack of support price for their produce, absence of intervention from government in addition to traders forming a syndicate. The national market policy e-NAM has not proved to be beneficial to the farmer.
In August this year, soya bean and maize crops, along with other crops, withered away in Nizamabad district due to dearth of monsoon. In September, untimely rains broke the back of the farmer. The standing crops got drenched in flood waters and soya bean and maize harvested became discoloured. Somehow, the farmer brought the crops to the market yard but there was no support price.
The market is dominated by traders. The government failed to open purchase centers to rival the traders. The farmer seems to have no alternative except approaching the traders to get the produce lifted. In some cases, the produce accumulated with no solution in sight to get remunerative price.
In Nizamabad market yard, the traders are apparently conducting themselves like mafia. The traders in the first week of commencement of marketing, purchased soya bean at a price of Rs 3550 per quintal over and above the support price declared by government – Rs 2775. The farmers felt happy, but it did not last long as the price slipped down to Rs 1650.
Maize was lifted at the rate of Rs 1900 per quintal initially. But it dipped to Rs 1200. The Markfed which is supposed to intervene surprisingly kept mum. Though farmers have been bringing maize to the market yard in huge quantities, there were no signs of Indira Kranti Patham or civil supplies department or Markfed opening purchase centers to lift the produce.
Taking advantage of the helpless condition of the farmers, the traders colluded and formed into a syndicate. The farmers have been lifting the produce at an unfair price putting the last straw on the camel’s back. The methods to decide on the quality of paddy at the market are thrown to the winds. The traders are manually examining paddy.
They quote online the price of their choice depriving the farmer to get an opportunity to sell his produce at the support price. There were allegations that the farmers, instead of storing their produce in ware houses at the market yard, are making a distress sale of the paddy because of the exorbitant prices quoted by commission agents.
The e-NAM mechanism was introduced in Nizamabad market yard and four other yards in the state on a selective basis. Since April this year, the traders are conducting sales transactions through E-NAM. The lifting operations through this mechanism till the Rabi are not so encouraging.
Subsequently, the area under various crops shrunk and yield dropped because of the drought. The sales’ operations through e-NAM were very few. Recently, 2000 lots of paddy were brought to the Nizamabad market following a bumper harvest because of the late seasonal rains. Conducting online trading seems to be impossible using E-NAM when such huge quantities were brought to the market yard.
By R Bhoopathi
