Negative inflation bad news for ryots

HYDERABAD/GUNTUR: Food inflation continued to be in the negative zone for the third consecutive week and was -0.42 per cent during the seven-year period to January 7.But while this may seem good news to urban consumers, it certainly was not for farmers who were forced to suffer huge losses and in many places opted to dump their produce rather than sell it at the mockery of a price they were being offered.The dip in the inflation rate was mainly due to the falling costs of potatoes and onions.Onion growers in Guntur, faced with the cumulative effect of untimely rains and price slump, were distressed and angry enough to dump their produce in the Krishna river a few days ago.“Last year we got `23 per kg of onions.Now, we hardly get `2 a kg.The average cultivation cost per acre is `50,000.We are finding it difficult to get even half of our investment back due to poor yield coupled with price slump,” said Sivasankar, a farmer.The distressed farmers are blaming the government for failing to set up procurement centres where they can get the minimum support price.With the farmers unable to bear the transportation costs to Chennai where they would get a better price, they are forced to sell at dirt cheap prices like `1 to `3 per kg to traders and middlemen.The situation is no different for farmers cultivating potatoes and tomatoes elsewhere in the state.Pot a t o g r o w e r s o f Narayankhed and Zaheerabad areas of Medak district are being forced to sell at as low as `1 per kg while it costs around `40,000 per acre to cultivate them.Distressed, they are hardly making an effort to harvest it from the fields.