THANJAVUR: Farmers in the district are disappointed as the price of paddy straw has steeply fallen during the current samba harvest season. Even as many farmers complain of reduced crop yield, they are also facing revenue loss as the price of paddy straw bales has plunged.
Farmers claimed traders are not even turning up to buy straw in many places and they have started to remove the bales from fields for storage. V Sudhakar of Budalur said he got upto Rs 100 per bale last year.
"However, this year the traders bought the bales only for Rs 50-Rs 60," he said, adding the traders who turned up at the commencement of harvest are not turning up now. As the traders are getting the straw at a cheaper rate in districts like Ramanathapuram, they have gone there, Sudhakar added. R Sundararajan of Kasanadu Thekkur had harvested the samba paddy cultivated on 4.5 acres two weeks ago and also bundled the paddy straw into bales.
"I have kept 200 bales of straw in a shed as there was a rain forecast. I had spent `40 for making a bale using a machine. However, no traders turned up till now to buy the bales," Sundararajan said. Earlier, the harvest machine operators from Salem used to buy the straw for traders in their district. "The price of the straw used to be adjusted against the rent for the harvest machine. But now there are no takers for the straw," he added.
AG Baskaran of Palliagraharam said he had harvested the paddy around a month ago but the paddy straw is still lying scattered on the field as no traders arrived yet. "There has been a glut of straw as the paddy is being harvested in a large area at the same time," he reasoned. The harvest of samba and thaladi paddy has been over in more than 75% of the area in the district. During the current season paddy was cultivated in 3,21,587 acres in the district.