)
Ahead of the beginning of the processing of sugarcane at Aska Cooperative Sugar Industries (ACSIL), the sugarcane growers in Ganjam district in southern Odisha have urged the factory authorities to fix the procurement rate of sugarcane at Rs 3500 per tonne at field level.
The oldest sugar industry in cooperative sector in the state paid Rs 2270 per tonne to the sugarcane farmers in the last crushing season. It included Rs 50 per tonne as transport subsidy.
"Due to the increase in input cost of cultivation, the procurement price should also be raised", said general secretary of Ganjam district sugarcane growers' association, Samira Pradhan. The association has submitted a memorandum to the factory secretary, SK Singh after a meeting of the sugarcane growers at Aska, about 40-km from here.
Association president and former MP, DK Panda presided over the meeting. Lok Sabha member from Aska, Ladu Kishore Swain and MLA (Aska), Debaraj Mohanty were present in the meeting.
Sugarcane growers in the district had suffered heavy loss due the cyclone Phailin which hit the district on October 12 last year. Though the government had declared a special package of Rs 4.99-crore for the sugarcane growers in the district, the farmers are yet to get the relief, except the fertilizer component, alleged association vice president, Narayan Jena.
"The factory authorities need to increase the sugarcane price to compensate the last year's loss due to Phailin and to encourage them cultivate sugarcane in more areas", said Pradhan.
"The factory will run for more days and make profit when the acreage of the sugarcane increased", he said. The association also demanded coverage of farmers under crop insurance taking panchayat as a unit.
The sugarcane area in the district has reduced drastically over the last few years as farmers no more think it to be a profit-making crop, said Jena. Around a decade ago, the sugarcane cultivation area was around 12,000-acres. It reduced to around 8,400-acres last year, he alleged.
"The price fixation committee will consider the demand of the farmers considering all aspects", said an official of ACSIL. The committee, under the chairmanship of the district collector, would meet before operation of the factory begins, he said. The factory authorities plan to start sugarcane crushing operation in the first week of January.
