Bitter harvest: Sugarcane glut has Solapur farmers in a sweat

To curb the losses, some cane growers are concentrating on jaggery production, but it’s neither easy nor remunerative

Ihave visited the sugar factory seven times, requesting them to lift the cane from my field as it is getting drier by the day. But all my pleas have been in vain,” says a tearful Mukesh Naganna Valsange, a farmer at Teerth village, 20 km from Solapur in Maharashtra. “If the cane harvest is delayed any longer, I will face huge losses.”

Valsange’s is not an isolated case. Like him, thousands of cane growers across the district are in a quandary as sugar factories in the region have failed to lift the produce in time. The reason: glut in cane production, which the district administration pegs at 4.5 lakh tonnes over last year’s output in Solapur alone. The situation is even more pronounced across the state, with the total production expected to be 850 lakh tonnes this season.

A delay in lifting the cane results in a 50 per cent loss of yield, spelling doom for a large number of farmers. “I had spent Rs 20,000 to raise cane and another Rs 30,000 on water pipeline to irrigate it,” says Vishvanath Birajdar, a cane grower in Valsang village. “But now the factories are refusing to cut the cane and due to 16-hour power cuts I can’t even irrigate the plants.”

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The plight of these farmers, particularly in Karmala taluka, is largely due to the political rivalry between two bigwigs: Ajit Pawar, nephew of Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, and former deputy chief minister Vijaysinh Mohite Patil. A majority of cane growers in the taluka belong to the Pawar camp. In the recent zila parishad and panchayat samiti elections, the Pawar candidate trounced the Patil contestant. The latter group, which runs a network of sugar factories in the adjoining Malshiras taluka, was directed by the state sugar commissioner to lift excess cane from Karmala region. But the orders have not been carried out.

“In the fight between these two Nationalist Congress Party leaders, we have got into trouble,” says Barkund Bao, who has five acres of cane in Chikaltha village of Karmala.

To curb the losses, some cane growers in Barshi taluka are now concentrating on jaggery production. But it is neither easy nor remunerative. “One tonne of cane gives us just 125 kg of jaggery. Rates fluctuate a lot and we get only Rs 700 for a tonne, but we have no other option,” says Narayan Madhav Gore, a farmer from Chikardi village in Barshi.

Meanwhile, the state government has come to the rescue of cane growers by announcing subsidies on transport and compensation in loss of sugar recovery. Says Rajgopal Devara, Maharashtra’s sugar commissioner: “We have received Rs 56 crore worth of funds for the transportation subsidy, while Rs 38 crore has been sanctioned as compensation for loss of recovery.” Besides, the government may extend the cane crushing season to June, giving the farmers an additional two weeks to process their cane.

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The sugar commissionerate has also directed several factories in the state to crush cane from areas that are facing the glut. “We are trying to shift sugarcane from Osmanabad and Latur districts to Solapur for crushing. Similarly, we have directed that excess production from Aurangabad, Beed and Jalna districts to be moved to Ahmednagar. We plan to move 18 lakh metric tonnes of cane,” explains Devara.

The commissionerate has also proposed incentives to promote jaggery production, like the government bearing the electricity cost for jaggery units and recovery loss compensation on the lines of those being offered for sugar.

However, the Shetari Sanghatna leader, Vasantrao Apte, expresses little faith in the government’s assurances on subsidy and compensations. “The subsidy is meagre. The Centre should come up with a good package to help the cane growers,” he says.