ONGOLE: Angered by continued low prices and large-scale rejection of their produce, tobacco farmers in Prakasam district have announced that they will boycott the ongoing auctions from July 3 if their demands are not met. The ultimatum came after an emergency meeting of tobacco farmer unions at the Ongole Tobacco Auction Centre on Saturday night.
The farmers are demanding fair prices for their produce—especially for bright-grade tobacco—and intervention by MARKFED to purchase low-grade tobacco stocks, as earlier promised by the state government and public representatives including Ministers Dr. Sidda Raghava Rao and Gottipati Ravikumar.
The meeting, chaired by Tobacco Board Vice Chairman B Brahmaiah, saw participation from union leaders including P. Narasimha Rao, V Prasad, Konda Reddy, and others representing various auction platforms under the Southern Light Soils (SLS) and Southern Black Soils (SBS) regions.
Despite government assurances, there has been no official action or MARKFED intervention in the auctions. Farmers are distressed over the high rejection rates of low-grade tobacco bales—22% of stocks were marked as “no bid” on Saturday alone. Between Monday and Saturday, over 12,000 bales were rejected across platforms.
On Saturday, farmers staged a protest at the Kanigiri auction platform, halting operations and submitting a memorandum to auction authorities. Similar protests occurred last week at Tangutur, Vellampalli, and Podili. Leaders demanded that the government immediately allocate Rs 2,000 crore to MARKFED, enabling it to participate in auctions and stabilise prices.
Unless action is taken by Thursday, union leaders warned of a complete boycott of the auctions.