Hill Farmers Appeal For Special Irrigation Schemes To Save Vegetable Crops
The immediate future looks gloomy for the hill vegetable growers due to lack of sufficient rains across the Nilgiris, says farmers
Ooty: The deficit rains in southwest monsoon have started to affect the yields of hill vegetables, forcing ordinary hill farmers in the Nilgiris to plead for special irrigation schemes from the existing water sources to carry on with hill vegetable cultivation until normalcy returns.
For the past couple of weeks, hill vegetables, especially carrot and beetroot began fetching between Rs 60 and Rs 75 per kg in the auction centres at Mettupalayam in the foothills of the Nilgiris. This upward trend helped the better-off farmers who could install advanced irrigation facilities to raise carrots and beetroot. But, for other farmers, the situation was appalling as the vegetable fields across the Nilgiris, which rely on seasonal and regular rainfall, began to suffer with lack of sufficient rains affecting the yield of standing vegetable crops.
C.K.N. Babu, secretary of the Nilgiris Potato and Vegetable Growers Association, said the immediate future looks gloomy for the hill vegetable growers due to lack of sufficient rains across the Nilgiris.
“Due to insufficient rainfall over the past two months of the SW monsoon, the yielding capacity of hill vegetables has come down by nearly 30 to 40 per cent. Only those farmers who have irrigation facilities see the survival of their crops. The hill farmers desperately need avenues for irrigation facilities from nearby existing water sources. The government should sanction digging bore wells in the farm fields to tide over the crisis,” he pleaded.
