KALPETTA: With bananas fetching Rs 61 a kg, the highest in the recent past, Wayanad's farmers are happy.
According to the data of the agriculture department, banana cultivation is spread across 8,000 hectares in the district.
Last Onam season too, they received a good price whereas in 2015 it had touched the all time low of '4 a kg.
In the retail market, the price of raw banana is Rs 80 to Rs 100. Mehjoor Prakkandi, a prominent trader here, said it hovered around '60 only for few days and then came down.
“The current price is '52,” he told DC. "The jump in price is due to the shrinking area of cultivation as many who incurred huge losses in 2015 either backed out or reduced the area of farming."
He said the downward trend in prices was due to the flow of banana from Tamil Nadu where the season had started.
“Our demand will be over by the end of this month, one week ahead of Onam festival,” he said. The present demand is for banana chips for exports.
Dennis George, a farmer from Pothukolly near Sulthan Bathery, incurred a loss of more than Rs 100 per banana plant in 2015. Planting around 900 bananas in an acre, his total loss of two acres was about Rs 2 lakh. For one banana bunch, the total cost of production is between Rs 140 to Rs 180. “This year a banana bunch of average size with a weight of around 10 kg fetched between Rs 500 to Rs 600,” he told DC.
Rs 5 cr grant for maintenance of race boats
The state government has decided to disburse '5 crore as grant to the snakesboats and other boats participating in boat races. The decision was taken on Tuesday during a meeting chaired by finance minister T.M. Thomas Isaac and tourism minister Kada-kampally Surendran.
As per the decision, a grant of Rs 1 lakh will be given to each of the 20 snakeboats that participate in boat races. Nine boats which had not got a one-time maintenance grant would get a grant of Rs 9 lakh each. Three boats St.Joseph, Alappatt, Sree Karthikey and Vadakke Attupuram, will get Rs 50,000 each.
Fourteen others in A category would get Rs 50,000 each, and 37 in B category Rs 30,000 each. It was also decided to give grant of Rs 25,000 each for fifty-two Palliyodams and its seva sanghams are to get Rs 10 lakh as grant.
