JEYPORE: Mango farmers in Koraput are facing severe crisis as flowering has been affected due to lack of rain.
According to sources, mango growers in Kundra, Borigumma, Nadnapur, Pottangi, Damantpur, Semiliguda, Laxmipur, Boipariguda, and Jeypore increased their cultivation area by nearly 5,000 acre under government schemes eyeing the annual production between May and July.
Adequate rain during second week of February to March is crucial for sustaining mango flowers for further growth.
Majority of mango trees depend on rainwater for flowering. As most of the mango cultivation is taken up in hilly and up land areas, it is not possible to water the trees manually.
The lack of rainfall this year, has hit the cultivation leaving 80 per cent of mango flowers damaged. “Rain water is essential for growing the mango flower as we cannot spray the water to whole parts of mango trees regularly.
This year we have no such downpour to help grow the mango flower,” said Sagar Samantaray, a mango farmer from Dangarpaunsi village.
Senior horticulturist at Jeypore Horticulture department, Sanjeev Kumar Mohanta confirmed that the absence of rainfall has affected the mango fruit this year.
“It is indeed the mango flowering stage has been hit for non rains in time and subsequent sudden heat wave that largely affected to grow the flower further and mostly the flowers destroy well before fruit making,” Mohanta said.