The area under pepper farming in Kerala has declined drastically during the last few years due to less viability relative to other cash crops like rubber.
A recent study by the Agricultural Market Intelligence Centre (AMIC) of Kerala Agricultural University reports that area under pepper farming has come down by 24% during last nine years while production has declined by almost?half during the same period due to decline in productivity and increase in cost of production.
?Pepper farming is under immense pressure. Instability in output price, high wage rates, shortage of labour, high incidence of diseases, decline in crop productivity, increase in cost of production and relatively lesser profitability when compared to?? competing crops is affecting the production,? K Satheesh Babu of AMIC told FE.
The area under cultivation reduced from 2.02 lakh hectare in 2000-01 to 1.54 lakh hectare in 2008-09. The productivity has also come down from 301 kg per hectare to mere 221 kg per hectare during the same period, he said. ?Consequently, the production has declined from 60,000 tonne to around 42,000 tonne during the corresponding period, recording a decline by 44.21 %,? he added.
Spices Board says that the multi-crop planting in Kerala and Tamil Nadu is a major reason for lower productivity in India. Vietnam leads in productivity with 1,200 kg to 1,300 kg from a hectare.
Fungal disease and quick wilt is rampant among pepper vines in Idukki leading to lower returns for farmers. Idukki, which produces more pepper than Wayanad, has been facing productivity problems, which has led the Spices Board to embark on a replantation and rejuvenation programme. Under the scheme, old, senile and disease affected pepper vines would be replanted with disease-free high yielding pepper vines in about 68,000 hectares.
The long-term outlook for pepper production looks bleak as figures reveal that farming area and productivity is on the decline in Kerala. The return on investment on pepper has been declining rapidly with farmers loosing heavily in the process. The return on investment has affected farmers and they are not keen to investing in the crop even as an inter-crop, a farmer said.
From the data for the year 2004-05, when the area under pepper cultivation in Wayanad district decreased to 41573 ha, and for the year 2005-06 when it further decreased to 41464 ha it is obvious that the heavily affected marginal and small have given up pepper cultivation. According to figures made available by the Kerala State Farmers’ Debt Relief Commission, the farmers have lost heavily in the last five years and are in debts. The estimates of cost of production and realization for a hectare for the last few years reveal that farmers have lost 80-87% of their investment.