Andhra Pradesh - Visakhapatnam   

Efforts on to cash in on cashew

Santosh Patnaik

INDUSTRYDOSSIER High-yielding grafts, steam-boiled processing, hike in plantation area being considered

VISAKHAPATNAM: A blueprint has been drawn to increase cashewnut production by motivating growers to go for high-yielding grafts.

The Department of Horticulture and the Andhra Pradesh Agriculture Export Development Agency (APEDA) have come forward to encourage eco-friendly steam-boiled processing and plant grafts brought from Bapatla (Andhra Pradesh), Vengurla (Maharashtra) and Vriddhachlam (Tamil Nadu) cashew research stations.

"As of now, we are doing well in Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram, Srikakulam, East and West Godavari districts in cashew plantation. We want to produce more by increasing the area under cashew and encouraging the farmers to go for the jumbo variety by following best management practices," Deputy Director (cashew project) of Horticulture R. Vaikunta Rao told The Hindu .

Among the five districts, West Godavari leads with farming in an area of 42,700 hectares, followed by 37,593 hectares in Visakhapatnam, 35,756 hectares in East Godavari, 22,600 hectares in Vizianagaram and 19,268 hectares in Srikakulam district.

Against the national average of 720 kg per hectares, Andhra Pradesh is able to get a per acre yield of 600 kg. "The yield is linked to maintenance and management practices by the farmers,'' said Assistant Director of Horticulture R. Srinivasa Rao.

In the five districts, the yield is on an average 4 kg per tree and the total production is 70,000 tonnes plus.

Processing units

The Horticulture Department has opened one farm in each district to motivate the growers to opt for grafts supplied by it at a subsidy of 50 per cent.

Owing to the popularity of Palasa cashew and the location of the town on the Orissa-Andhra border, processing plants are concentrated in and around Palasa-Kasibugga. Hence, Srikakulam district has 160 units, followed by East Godavari 20, Visakhapatnam 11, West Godavari three and Vizianagaram two.

The growers are being asked to abandon the drum-roasting system and adopt steam-boiled processing. Several batches of farmers were also sent to Goa and Tamil Nadu to study the processing techniques followed there.

Plans have been drawn to popularise oil-bath-roasting technique, which is very popular in Goa.

A steam boiled processing plant is being set up on an experimental basis at Sitammapeta in Srikakulam with the main objective of creating awareness among girijans. The response for the project is good and many farmers have shown interest to set up units. The Government is offering 25 per cent investment subsidy.

Societies

As the growers are not getting good price, it has been proposed to form cooperative societies with the help of APITCO for organised marketing from next year. This will help in preventing the middlemen from cheating the small farmers.

There is still a lot of scope for producing cashew kernel (raw nut) due to the huge gap between demand and supply. As against domestic and export requirement of 10 lakh tonnes per annum, the country is producing five lakh tonnes and importing 2.5 lakh tonnes leaving a shortfall of 2.5 lakh tonnes.

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