THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The production of neera, the unleavened toddy collected from coconut flowers, which had picked up two years ago to 40,000 litres a day has now dwindled to 2000 litres. The prodcution of neera was actively encouraged by the Coconut Development Board under then chairman T.K. Jose, at present additional chief secretary, industries and commerce. Mr Jose was also instrumental in setting up coconut farmer producer companies in large numbers where hordes of Neera technicians including tappers and coconut pluckers were appointed.
At present, there are 29 coconut production companies in the state. However, once Mr Jose left, the CDB also lost interest in the project, say farmer companies. K. Shahjahan, chairman of Coconut Production Companies, said Mr Jose used to hold monthly review meetings with them which saw neera out of the Kerala Abkari Act. “Earlier, our Kaipuzha Neera agency at Karunagapally used to produce 3500 – 4000 litres per day after commercial production started in January 2015. But now it has come down to hardly 1500 litres. I feel the CDB failed in its marketing strategy.”
He feels that the government could not sustain the initial spurt as, by mid-2016, there was a “sudden break”. The remaining companies in Palakkad, Piravom and Ambalapuzha are also producing hardly 50 to 100 litres per day. Dr B. N. Srinivasa Murthy, the former national commissioner of horticulture, heads the board now. Mr Shahjahan said now the officials are not serious about increasing production.
But Dr Babu Mathew who was the principal investigator of neera project in Thiruvananthapuram, until two days ago, which comes under Kerala Agriculture University at Vellayani, said the state government was taking massive steps to revamp the technology used for production. “At 30 – 40 litre of ‘Keraamrutham’ is still being produced every day, and neera sip-up which is a value-added product is also available in the market now. It is true that neera production has come down sharply because of the different technologies the coconut producing societies use,” he told DC. "Now efforts are on to come up with a uniform technology so that it can be sustained."
