Karnataka   

Onion crop loss upsets farmers

Chitradurga: Sixty-five-year-old Bosappa, an onion grower from Lingaravahatti village of Chitradurga taluk, is a worried man. Showing his crop to this correspondent, who visited the village on Saturday, he said it had become so rotten that it could not even be used as fodder.

Mr. Bosappa has cultivated onion on his three-acre farm. Owing to continuous rainfall, a substantial amount of it has been destroyed.

He has been cultivating onion for 15 years and is solely dependent on the crop for his livelihood. Now, he is hoping for some relief from the Government.

Similar is the tale of several farmers of the village whose standing crop has been fully or partially submerged.

The primary source of income for over 150 families of the village is onion. Most of them are small farmers.

A local leader, Nagaraj, said agriculture was the major occupation of residents of 14 villages which come under the Dyamavanahalli Gram Panchayat.

“All of them are mostly dependent on onion, which they have been cultivating for decades. Last year, owing to adequate rainfall and good prices, farmers made profits. But this year the situation is bad,” he said.

Krishnappa, another small farmer who has also lost his onion crop grown on seven acres, said that last year he made a profit of nearly Rs. 50,000, but this year he had incurred heavy losses.

“Forget about profit, I will not even recover my cost of cultivation,” he said.

He said farmers had spent nearly Rs. 20,000 an acre on onion cultivation.

If they got a good price for their produce, they would not only make up previous losses but also make good profits.Most farmers take loans with the hope of better yield. When asked why most farmers did not opt for crop insurance, Mr. Krishnappa said, “Last year, for sunflower, we paid Rs. 500 an acre as insurance premium. They paid us only Rs. 140 an acre as compensation when we lost crop on account of poor rainfall. What is the use of going in for crop insurance if we are not paid adequate compensation to recover losses,” he asked.

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