TIRUPPUR: Amid the indefinite strike, garment and cotton mills cite hoarding by traders among the reasons for the yarn price increase. Farmers, however, say there is not much of cotton cultivation in western TN and this is pushing up demand. Farmers say they are reluctant to take up cotton cultivation because of water shortage and a lack of support from the government.
Federation of Tamil Nadu Agriculturists Associations secretary S Nallasamy said, “Coimbatore and Tiruppur together are known as Manchester of India. The government decided to encourage cotton cultivation as mills sprung up here. But lack of water affect them, and the Lower Bhavani irrigation scheme was implemented. This revived the fortunes of farmers in Coimbatore and Erode in 1960s.
Gradually, cotton cultivation increased in the next three decades. But, the government did not support farmers in issues like disease management or distributing compensation. If cotton cultivation gets bigger in the State, dependency on other States could become zero.”
Tamil Nadu Farmers Association (Tiruppur) vice president SR Madhusoodan said, “Cotton cultivated in over one lakh hectare in Coimbatore, Tiruppur, and Erode districts were severely affected for four years in the nineties. Since crop insurance wasn’t available to many farmers and compensation from State and Union governments wasn’t adequate, thousands were financially trapped. Even the cotton mills were reluctant to support us and moved towards North and Western India for their raw materials. Farmers moved towards cultivating maize and other crops.”
Tamil Nadu Spinning Mills Association (TNSMA) - Special Adviser Dr Venkatachalam said the State and Centre must encourage farmers towards cotton cultivation by helping them in pest control measures.
Former Joint Director (Agriculture) Tiruppur, A Manoharan said, “Due to heavy arrivals in TN in 1992-1998, prices crashed upsetting thousands of cotton farmers, particularly in Coimbatore, and Erode.
Later, wilt and bollworms wreaked havoc across the State for several seasons. Despite trying traditional and scientific methods to control pests, farmers couldn’t get sufficient yield. I estimate cultivation had dropped from 80,000 hectares to just 500 hectares in Coimbatore at that time. BT Cotton, which is resistant to bollworm, was introduced but most farmers had shifted to other crops by then.”
Tiruppur Exporters Association (TEA) Executive Secretary S Sakthivel said, “Every stage of the crop is prone to pest attack and farmers use over five kinds of insecticides. This accounts for a big portion of their investment. Since the pest attack was severe, several small farmers called it quits in the 1990s.”
