BHUBANESWAR: It seems to be raining misery on Odisha’s farmers this year. Already reeling under the burden of drought and pest attack, the damage to crop caused by unseasonal rain has now added to their woes.The Special Relief Commissioner (SRC)’s office on Monday calculated that at least 3,84,018 hectare crop area under cultivation have suffered damage above 33 per cent due to rains. At least, 12.49 lakh farmers have faced loss inflicted by the cyclonic rains earlier this month.
As many as 19 districts have reported crop damage in 15,000 villages, SRC Bishnupada Sethi said adding, the numbers are provisional and may change.Ganjam bore the brunt with crops over 97,233 hectare facing damage. The total number farmers who have faced some kind of loss stands at 3.5 lakh. In Kendrapara, the affected crop area was 72,322 hectare and the farmers’ number was 2.65 lakh.Other districts which faced major damage included Jajpur (49,298 hectare), Puri (39,952 hectare) and Nayagarh (24,792 hectare).
The report also showed that damage to paddy crop was over 3.68 lakh hectare. This loss, during the harvesting time, could cause more distress to the farm sector which has been under mercy of the climatic conditions.First, it was drought which had led to crop loss in 3.17 lakh hectare area in 5,959 villages of 15 districts. If that was not enough, pest attack took a further toll. As many as 24 districts reported pest attack in 8,092 villages and 148 Wards. The loss to standing ripe crops was over 1.28 lakh hectare.
Taken together, the back to back strike of nature has affected close to half the villages in the State. The bad news is that the weather office has already predicted more rains during the first week of December which may affect the farmers further.The State Government has already released input subsidy for the farmers for drought and pest attacks.