High retail tag no relief for pulses growers

Retail prices of pulses have shot up 25-30 per cent in the last one year, forcing the government to ban exports and ease imports of the commodity.

However, the high prices have done little to improve the situation of farmers like Lalit Dash of Aradipada village in Orissa's Cuttack district.

"This year, we sold biri (urad) at Rs 20 per kg, half of what we got last year," Dash said. This may be better than the minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 17 but is peanuts when compared with the previous year's price. It's a similar story for moong, whose market price is higher than the MSP but Rs 500 per quintal less than what the farmers got last year.

India meets 50 per cent of its requirement of pulses through imports as its production is only 12-15 million tonnes (mt). Pulses are in short supply, but the farmers have not gained.

T Haque, former chairperson of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP), said: "The pulses growers needs better prices and sufficient incentives to increase yield. There is not much supply in the world to be imported. Hence, increasing productivity is the only way forward." The MSP can't help as there is hardly any government procurement of pulses, Haque admits.

"Why should the farmer grow more and reap more losses?" says Vijay Jaiwanthia, a spokesperson of farmers in suicide-prone Wardha district of Maharashtra.

In Wardha, prices of chana or gram fell by Rs 500 a quintal last month from Rs 2,700 to Rs 2,200. Soya prices fell by Rs 350 a quintal from Rs 2,300 to Rs 1,950, tuvar or pigeon pea fell by Rs 400 a quintal and groundnut by Rs 400.

To help farmers, the CACP has recommended 30-42 per cent rise in the MSP. This is in line with the recommendation of the MS Swaminathan-led National Commission for Farmers that the MSP for all farm products should be raised so that a farmer can reap 50 per cent profit, up from the 15 per cent he earns at present.

Anti-inflation measures like raids on traders are also wreaking havoc on prices. Jaiwanthia and a team of farmers told Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh last week that traders were refusing to buy due to the fear of raids over violation of stockholding limits. "Hence farmers are resorting to distress sale of pulses," he says.

 All hay and no sunshine for paddy farmers