Plea to cover banana also under crop insurance

Puliyur Nagarajan, a banana farmer and State president of TMC agri wing explained about the pathetic condition of the farmers in the district. He explained that there are around 30,000 acres under banana cultivation. All the efforts of the farmers had gone down the drain as the entire crop had wilted in Tiruchy and karur districts. 

The expenses for this cultivation is very high and also it has not been covered under the crop insurance scheme. He said, it is not unusual for the banana farmers face loss. But this time the situation was really bad and the crops had withered away completely and as a result, the loss faced by the famers was huge. So he appealed to the Collector extend the insurance scheme to banana crops too. 

Similarly, the farmers pointed out that out of the total 58,000 hectares of land, only 18,000 hectares was used for cultivation and they demanded compensation for the remaining farmers who had not taken up cultivation anticipating water shortage. Meanwhile, in Pudukkottai, it was a different request made to the Collector. 

The farmers urged the district administration for early disbursement of the drought relief fund as the interest for their various loans, for taking up Samba cultivation, has been increasing day by day. While the Tiruvarur famers urged the Government to waive the farm loans instead of restructuring them. As medium term loan was announced, it would add to the debt burden of the already beleaguered farmers.