Telangana’s rising cotton acreage could spell trouble

The Telangana government’s simply call to farmers to mature cotton on 70 lakh acres as versus the regular space of 40-forty five lakh acres came in as a shock to cotton sector watchers in the State.

4 many years back, the State launched a marketing campaign ‘Patti Vaddu, Soya Muddu’ (Say no to cotton, say sure to soya), with a target to lessen the cotton production by 30 for every cent when the State was developing the fibre crop on 40 lakh acres.

The govt experienced then argued that there were no takers for cotton in the domestic and global markets. The farmers relented and reduce down on cotton that calendar year.

It, however, attained the peak amounts of forty five-forty six lakh acres in the last number of many years as the crop provided the farmers respectable returns.

But Monday’s assertion by the Main Minister inquiring the farmers to boost the acreage to 70 lakh acres, or by fifty-55 for every cent, came as a significant shock to farmers’ leaders.

Paddy or cotton?

Following a report production of a person crore tonnes of paddy this calendar year, the govt expected that the paddy space would jump to 70 lakh acres from the existing 40-forty five lakh acres as sumptuous availability of water from new irrigation tasks coming in useful to farmers.

The change in focus in favour of cotton may well be aimed at discouraging farmers from expanding the water-guzzling paddy crop.

Abnormal dependence on a person crop could bring about great troubles if weather plays truant. Looking at the large investments required for the fibre crop, a unsuccessful time could leave farmers in extreme distress. The costs are also linked to global desire, which is cyclical in mother nature, and could force them to losses if there are no takers.

Cotton, while confident least returns to farmers, has been a bring about of concern at any time considering the fact that the space shot up after the introduction of GM cotton about 15 many years back. It led to acute farm distress, pushing farmers to extreme monetary disaster.

Farmers are not finding more than ₹3,000 a quintal, S Malla Reddy, Vice-President of All-India Kisan Sabha, felt.

Woes aplenty

Unexpected boost in cotton acreage could also lead to extreme scarcity of seeds. Good quality seeds are not a thing that can be procured in a quick span of time, explained Kanneganti Ravi, Convener of Rythu Swarajya Vedika.

Reddy argues that there has been no enumeration of soil well being playing cards in the State. Without a proper evaluation of the soil, there is no use bringing in a paradigm change in the cropping sample. In its place of going for a large jump in cotton acreage, the govt can experiment it in a number of districts as it receives prepared with a crop map for various districts. It ought to build a product, with a trusted credit history guidance system and a very good post-harvest guidance composition, assisting the farmers get very good returns at the markets.

In the absence of a sturdy advertising guidance system, the extreme emphasis on a person crop would not give self-assurance to farmers. The Federal government ought to talk about with the Nabard and SLBC (State-degree Banking Committee) for more credit history guidance to the farmers.

Also, some other challenges this sort of as no point out of dryland crops this sort of as millets, too, need to have to be addressed.