Cap on procurement of jowar irks farmers in Telangana’s Adilabad

Growers left with no option but to sell the grains to private traders, resulting in losses

Adilabad: A limit on procurement of jowar produce set by the State government has irked farmers in the district.

Officials said that jowar crop was raised in 79,000 acres in the district this year. They expected that the district would record an yield of around 2.5 lakh quintals. The government opened procurement centres in Adilabad, Jainath, Echoda, Boath, Indervelli, Neradigonda, Sirikonda and Utnoor mandals for the convenience of the farmers.

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However, the government recently set a limit in procurement of jowar grains from farmers. It is buying only 8.65 quintals from each farmer by offering a minimum support price of Rs 3,371 per quintal. The growers who grow the crop in large extents of land are worried over the norm.

Farmers raised the crop facing shortage of labourers, lack of irrigation facility and unfavourable climatic conditions. They are seeing yield of 18 quintals per acre. Growers who registered higher yield than 8.65 quintals are struggling to sell the grains. They said that they were facing inconvenience due to the cap on procurement.

Shartha Naveen, a grower from Boath, said that it was unfair to impose limits on procurement of the grains, which was causing problems to the growers. “We are forced to guard the leftover produce shifted to procurement centres by waking up throughout the night. We are left with no option but to sell the grains to private traders, resulting in losses,” he explained.

The farmers requested the government to buy the grains without cap and help them in registering profits in raising the crop. They urged the officials to take steps to commence the procurement in all the centre at the earliest. They regretted that they were waiting for beginning of the process for a week. They stated that the officials assured to start the process a few days back, but the grains were not procured in majority of the centres so far.