Sri Lanka’s Minister of Industry and Commerce has directed a Provincial Council famed as the leading potato supplier to the country, to immediately resolve a humiliating situation faced by a set of humble potato farmers for 23 continued years after they earnestly appealed to him of their distress on 15 August. More importantly, the Minister also announced that he will push his efforts on their struggle- indicative of issues faced by many farmers in the country –all the way up to the Cabinet of Ministers.
“We need to support these suffering farmers. I shall present a Cabinet Paper and help these harassed farmers and resolve it” vowed the Minister of Industry and Commerce Rishad Bathiudeen on 15 August at the Ministry. Minister Bathiudeen announced this after his discussions with a group of potato farmers from the Uva Province who met Minister Bathiudeen on August with State Minister of Labour and Trade Unions Relations Ravindra Samaraweera. Joining Minister Bathiudeen on 15 August were Secretary of the Ministry Chinthaka Lokuhetti, Additional Secretary (Food and Cooperatives) Malkanthi Ekanayake, Cooperartives Commissioner and Registrar of Cooperatives S.L. Naseer.
Uva Province is the leading potato assembly centre in Sri Lanka, annually producing 65 percent of domestic supply. More than 20000 farmers are engaged in potato farming in both Badulla (Uva Province) and Nuwara Eliya (Central Province) Districts. Uva Province has many Producer Cooperative Societies active and they face the critical issue of sourcing seed potatoes, which is costly. The government earlier planned to ban seed potato imports by 2016 to encourage domestic seed production but due to demand surge, still allows imports. Sri Lanka produced 70377 MT of potatoes in 2014/15 and it increased by 14% to 80458 MT in 2015/2016’s harvest. The extent of cultivation in 2015/’16 was 5092 Hectares, also an increase of 14.5% from previous season’s 4447 Ha.
The Uva farmers explained the grave crisis faced by them on a potato seed loan they obtained way back 23 years ago -in 1994. “Our cost of production is high. Seed potato, the most essential item is very expensive. Therefore we continuously resort to loans to get our seed potato” said HM Jayathilleke,a group leader of the farmers. “When we take seed potato loan what actually happens is instead of money, the Cooperative directly gives us the seed potatoes, and we are in debt to that value and we pay back in cash later. More than 300 farmers who obtained the loaned seed potatoes in 1994 from Udapalatha Multi-Purpose Cooperative Society (UMPCS) in Keppetipola, later discovered that the seeds were damaged, virus infected and were useless. We never paid back this loan simply because the product was defective and useless. However, UMPCS, in spite of their mistake which they covered up, complained to authorities about our non-payment and since 1994, many of us have been routinely rounded up, and remanded even at present similar to remanding of criminals, and a family member usually bails us out. This is highly humiliating to us and our families. This remand issue is on top of the discrimination we faced from the UMPCS which is guilty of giving damaged seeds to us in the first place. Our total loan at Rs 10 million in 1994 has now ballooned to Rs 20.7 Million and we are in dire straits to settle this. We call for your urgent intervention in this and support us as the Cooperative Minister.”
The Udapalatha Multi-Purpose Cooperative Society (UMPCS) in Keppetipola, was previously known as Paalugama Agri Producers Cooperative Society, and Paalugama was a milestone in Sri Lanka’s cooperative history-It was the first cooperative in Sri Lanka specifically organised and established to solely support agro-producers agro-farmers in the country.
“As the Minister in charge of Cooperatives, it is my duty to help you and resolve this” said Minister Bathiudeen, and added: “Potatoes are considered as the king of vegetables and it is of such high use here, there is an MRP for imported potatoes but no such MRP for local potatoes–this is to support you, the farmers. I am directing my Cooperative officials to immediately get in touch with relevant authorities in Uva PC. We shall support you, as suffering farmers. I shall present a Cabinet Paper and help you to resolve it. Farmers are a group that the government wants to support at all times and you are no exception. I also direct my officials including the Cooperatives Commissioner to consider possible waivers of your loans since the seeds given to you by the Coop seem to be useless, defective and you cannot be blamed. I and my Ministry officials are always ready and available to help resolve your farming and coop issues as well.”
The farmers thanked Minister Bathiudeen heartily for his prompt action and also praised his Ministry officials for the support given.
National level cooperative policy making that affects Provincial Cooperative Ministries as well as the Cooperative Commissioner are under the purview of Minister Bathiudeen’s Industry and Commerce Ministry. The Gazette 2003/44 has introduced a Maximum Retail Price for imported potatoes at 120.00 per kilo which was later revised down by last year’s Budget to Rs 115.00 per kilo of imported potatoes. As a support for domestic farmers the government does not maintain an MRP for locally produced potatoes.