In Agra division, the potato belt of UP, as many as 10 lakh bags of potatoes (five lakh quintals) of the last season kept in cold storages were destroyed as the farmers refused to lift the produce due to glut in the market.

Even at the low rate of Rs 250 per quintal, the cost of destroyed potatoes is over Rs 12 crore.

“The glut in the market has adversely affected both the farmers and cold storage owners,” said Raghavendra Singh who owns a chain of cold storages in Sirsaganj of Mainpuri district. “We had no option but to throw away the stored potatoes of last season as the farmers were not interested in taking them.”

The Agra region alone produces more than 30 per cent of the country’s total potato yield.

According to agriculture experts, farmers have to spend Rs 5, 500 for cultivating potatoes on one bigha of land. The returns from the same isn’t even Rs 3,000 at present

“Potato farmers are indeed in dire straits and this is largely due to lack of food processing industries in the state,” said C P Tewari, director of the state horticulture department, adding, “The Government is taking measures for the export of the potatoes to other states and also providing export transport subsidy.”

The harvesting of the current season’s crop is on since early December and the price in major mandis hover over Rs 130 to Rs 150 per quintal. The ruling price of the potato last year was between Rs 225 and Rs 250 per quintal.

“This is only the beginning as so far only the ‘Kucchi crop’ of potato has started to arrive. The prices will fall further when the harvesting is at its peak by February-end,” said Raghavendra Singh. The farmers who opt for wheat sowing go for early harvesting of potatoes while others do so in mid-February.

The failure of “market intervention scheme” of the state Government has only added to the woes of the farmers. The government for 2007-08 had announced to procure 1 lakh MT of potatoes from the farmers at the rate of Rs 250 per quintal.

The horticulture department claimed that the farmers in the hope of getting better prices preferred to put their produce in cold storages rather than sell it to government agencies at Rs 225 per quintal.

“The horticulture department had opened 29 potato purchase centres in 16 districts but the total purchase was only 130 quintals,” said BD Ram, deputy director, potato, horticulture department.

He added that “for the current season, final touches were being given to the market intervention scheme”.

The farmers, however, reject the government’s contention, saying that the token purchase by the horticulture department was of inferior quality and that too from traders just for the sake of record. Besides, they added that they were not aware of purchase centres being opened in the potato belt.

“Potato procurement centres were opened only on papers,” claimed Sudhir Shukla, a farmer of Farrukhabad district.

Export office of potatoes defunct for two years

The previous Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh had mulled setting up vodka and potato chip units but the change of government in May, 2007 put paid to the plan.

In 2005, a ‘UP potato export facilitation society’ was set up by the UP State Agriculture Produce Marketing Board, which is better known as Mandi Parishad.

The society included 22 farmers drawn from major potato producing districts like Kanpur, Kannauj, Farrukhabad, Etah, Etawah, Mainpuri, Agra, Bagpat and Meerut. These farmers were also sent to Jaipur for training at National Institute of Agriculture Marketing (NIAM). They also visited Sri Lanka, Dubai and a few other South East Asian nations to explore the markets. The Mandi Parishad incurred an expenditure of nearly Rs 20 lakh on the tour and training programme of the farmers. In 2005, the Mandi Parishad set up an office at Vashi in Mumbai the cost of Rs 25 lakh. It also hired a cold storage and members of the society were asked to take their potatoes to Vashi. The office of the society at Vashi is lying unused for last two years.

Uttar Pradesh accounts for more than 30 per cent of potatoes produced in India. The state also has the highest number of cold storages — 1,316, — with a storage capacity of 92 lakh MT.