Shopian: Fruit growers and traders in south Kashmir are furious at the government for not announcing any financial relief for the fruit industry in the Rs 13,000 crore package for revival of economic growth.
According to the 2017 economic survey, 34 lakh population in Kashmir, comprising more than 7,00,000 families, has horticulture as their lone source of livelihood.
Muhammad Amin Peer, former president of the Fruit Mandi Shopian, told Kashmir Reader that there is nothing for the fruit industry in the LG’s package. “We are planning to go for a strike. We have been neglected again,” he said.
Peer asked if the government wasn’t aware of what had happened to the fruit industry since last year’s untimely and devastating November snowfall, and the fruit which was spoiled lying in cold stores due to the post-August 5 situation.
According to official data, more than 30 percent of the apple crop in Kashmir was damaged due to early and heavy snowfall in November last year. The government later issued relief of Rs 2,000 per kanal of land which, according to growers, was negligible compensation.
Ayaz Ahmad, an apple grower in Kulgam, said that the horticulture sector in Kashmir has only witnessed decline in returns and rise in investments since 2010. “There should have been a major economic package for the fruit industry, but it was totally ignored,” he said.
According to a senior bank officer in Shopian, around 90 percent of growers in the district have taken bank loans or have applied for it in recent years. He said that since the launch of the Kisan Credit Card scheme, almost every orchardist took the loan but most of them failed to clear their debts.
Kashmir has over 3.4 lakh hectares of land under horticulture cultivation, of which apple occupies about 50 percent of the area.
Muhammad Umar Shah, a leading fruit grower in Pulwama, said that 2020 is the year when Kashmir apple sustained the worst-ever damage from fungal diseases, which have affected 40 percent of the crop this year. “In this time of crisis, the apple industry was in dire need of relief. But it hasn’t happened,” he said.
Orchardists and traders blame the sub-standard pesticides and fungicides supplied to orchardists in the time of Covid-19 lockdown and no checking or testing as responsible for the widespread fungal diseases. Horticulture experts, though, blame the incessant rains during flowering and pea-nut stage for the diseases.
The Kashmir apple industry on average produces 25 lakh metric tonnes of apple every year, for which the region has capacity to store only about 1.5 lakh metric tonnes in cold chains.
President of Shopian Fruit Mandi, Muhammad Ashraf, said that they are still optimistic that the government will announce a separate economic package for them. “On the one hand the prime minster is talking of doubling the income of farmers by 2022 and on other hand rates of our produce have fallen to half. It is a decline we have been witnessing since 2000,” Ashraf lamented.
He said that all the production costs, be they transport charges, costs of pesticides and fertilisers, labour wages, and prices of boxes have doubled or more since a decade, but not the rates of Kashmiri fruits.
“Even the market intervention scheme isn’t working this year. There is huge quantity of B and C grade apple this year and the government should reintroduce it so that it can get a better market,” Ashraf said.
Director of Horticulture, Kashmir, Ajaz Ahmad Bhat refused to comment on why there was nothing for horticulture in the government’s economic package. He, however, said that there are umpteen schemes through which growers are being helped. “Our fruit is getting best rates in the market,” he said.
When asked why the market intervention scheme (MIS) was not continued this year, he said that the situation this year is not so bad as last year. “There are no barriers to transport this year. We have worked even in the Covid period to ensure smooth transportation of fruit. However, we are in touch with the authorities to continue the MIS scheme,” he said.

Raashid Hassan