Enhance custom duty on oil palm, says Harish

The cultivation of oil palm is spread in Siddipet, Gajwel, Dubbak, Husnabad and Jangon constituencies in the district.

Siddipet: Former Minister T Harish Rao on Sunday demanded that the Centre increase the custom duty on oil palm imports to 15 per cent from the existing 12.5 per cent to help oil palm farmers in the country get better prices.

Oil palm farmers were getting barely Rs.13,000 for a tonne of oil palm harvest, he said, adding that that the Congress government in the State was not gving Rs 4,200 towards crop management per year which the BRS government had introduced. He demanded the release of arrears of six months immediately.

---

The State government was also not continuing the drip system to oil palm farmers, he said. Speaking after beginning the harvesting of oil palm at Akkenapally village in Nanganur mandal on Sunday, Harish Rao said India was still depending on imports of 60 per cent of oil palm from other countries.

Saying that there was a huge scope for oil palm cultivation in the country, Rao said the previous BRS government had aimed to increase oil palm cultivation in the State to 20 lakh acres.

Now, oil palm was cultivated in 40,000 acres in the State. He urged the Congress government to make similar efforts to increase and support oil palm cultivation in the State.

Stating that farmers in Khammam district were reaping rich benefits by cultivating cocoa as an internal crop in oil palm farms, Harish Rao said he had spoke to a leading chocolate company, which was already supporting Khammam farmers, to help Siddipet farmers as well to take up cocoa as an internal crop.

Cocoa farmers in Khammam were getting huge profits because the price of a kilo of cocoa had gone up to Rs.900 from Rs.250.

Farmers here could double their income by cultivating cocoa. The chocolate company would support cocoa cultivation in Siddipet soon after opening an office here, he said, adding that an oil palm crushing company would also be opened in Narmetta by April 2025.

Meanwhile, Rao demanded the Telangana government to implement the promised Rs.500 bonus for all varieties of paddy.

Siddipet oil palm farmers are set for first harvest:

Oil palm farmers in Siddipet district are celebrating the first harvest of their efforts in the relatively new sector. The first farmer to trigger the celebrations was at Akkenepally village in Nanganur mandal on Sunday.

Former Minister T Harish Rao had put a lot of focus to encourage the farmers to take up oil palm cultivation in the district, with the previous BRS government making oil palm one of the priority crops and launching multiple initiatives to encourage farmers take up the crop.

Following Harish Rao’s encouragement, 26 farmers in Akkenapally village took up cultivation in 168 acres three years ago (2021-22). Tippani Nagendar was among one of these 26 farmers. Since Nagendar’s crop was ready for harvest, he invited Harish Rao on Sunday and got the first crop harvested by his hands.

The harvested crop will be transported to Kothagudem district for crushing. The cultivation of oil palm was started in 2021-22 when Akkenapally farmers were the first to respond to the call from the then government. Since then, the area under oil palm cultivation has increased to 11,105 acres in the district.

As many as 3,339 farmers took up the cultivation. The cultivation of oil palm is spread in Siddipet, Gajwel, Dubbak, Husnabad and Jangon constituencies in the district.

Speaking to Telangana Today, Nagendar said he was delighted to reap the first harvest in the district. He said he had invited Harish Rao to his farm as a tribute to his efforts for encouraging them to take up the cultivation, adding that they were given a number of subsidies to support them.

The farmers will get the harvest done in 416 acres by December this year. The harvest of the crop commences in the fourth year after planting the saplings. It is expected to give 3 to 4 tonnes of harvest in the year and could go up to 12-14 tonnes in the 10th year gradually increasing year-on-year.

The crop is said to continue to give harvest for 30 years. The farmers stand chances of earning Rs.1.80 lakh profit from the 10th year to the 30th year.

The profit is a few times higher than what the farmers would get by cultivating traditional crops like cotton, paddy and others. The farmers can also grow other internal crops to earn additional income every year, agriculture officials said. M