Rain-related crop damages in cash-crop rich Kerala have crossed Rs 2,000 crore, according to official estimates. Except rubber and cardamom, all crops, including pepper and coffee, have taken a tough battering from the summer rain.
Going strictly by the central relief norms, the state has drawn up a relief memorandum totaling about Rs 222 crore. “The actual losses would be ten times of this and a separate memoradum detailing this would be also filed,” Kerala revenue minister KP Rajendran said.
In Wayanad, which accounts for a substantial share of country’s coffee plantations, harvesting was affected. About one-tenth of the crop was abandoned in the bush. Because of continuous rains, beans could not be dried, according to K Moidu, president, Wayanad Coffee Growers Association.
Pepper vines normally call for summer heat to mature to an optimum yield. In the last fiscal, pepper exports are close to 32,000 tonne (provisional figures), when the rains put an end to the price-realisation picnic. In Wayanad alone, there were crop damages to the tune of Rs 115 crore, according to early estimates, Rajendran said.
For rubber, the summer rains give a new fillip to latex production, jacking up per tree output in the season-end. Similarly, cardamom growers, resigned to a fall in production in the last fiscal, got a pleasant surprise from the summer rains. This is expected to give a better crop in next February.