TIRUPPUR: Coconut farmers are upset with the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India. (NAFED) has not made payment for procurement for more than 40 days. According to official records, 11,170 tonnes of copra have been procured from 7,294 farmers through seven procurement centers till May 31. Of this, 2691 tonnes were procured from Pongalur and 2,328 tonnes were procured from Udumalaipet. The procurement began on April 1 and will end on September 30.
Speaking to TNIE, Tamil Nadu Farmers Union - President U Paramasivam said,"Coconuts are procured at Rs 108 per kilogram. Officials from Tiruppur Market Committee through their Copra Procurement Centres are procuring 200-300 kilogram from an acre. But when the payments are delayed, they are unhappy. A farmer has to wait for 40 days to receive payment of Rs 30,000-40,000"
Speaking to TNIE, Tamil Nadu farmers Association (Udumalaipet) secretary C Manoharan said,"This has been raging for the past three months, when the procurement began in Tiruppur district, as there are plenty of coconut farms in the taluk. I believe there are over 200 coconut farmers in each of the seven copra procurement centres in Tiruppur district. But, officials in procurement centre are tight lipped and say NAFED is responsible for payments''
An official from NAFED - TN Division said,'There were some server issues, but the problems have been resolved. Besides, after the arrivals to godowns of Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC), the WareHouse Receipts (WHR) are transferred to NAFED from the Agricultural Marketing Board. There are some delays in this chain, so farmers are not getting payments on time. They will surely get the money."