The Hindu Business Line : Narmada basin set to cultivate `Dana' banana

SOMETIME in the near future, if you pick up a bunch of the popular `Dana' brand of bananas while travelling abroad, you may discover that they come from this small town on the banks of Narmada.

Nader Ibrahim and Company Ltd, the Philippines-based agricultural major that owns the `Dana' brand of bananas, is set to tie up with a farmers' cooperative at Jagadia near Bharuch in Gujarat for contract farming of the horticulture crop.

To begin with, Nader Ibrahim would commit to buy the produce from about 500 acres, of which 250 acres would be taken up in the first phase. The farmers would grow the international bestseller G-9 variety of banana and sowing will start in a phased manner by the end of next month.

The farmers would have to adopt drip irrigation and use only tissue-culture plants, while the Philippines company would provide the growth hormones and plastic bags to protect the growing fruit from pests and dust.

The contract will be signed soon, after Nader Ibrahim and its Indian partners register a subsidiary company that would deal with the farmers.

"The contours of the contract farming deal have already been worked out. Only the formal signing remains to be done. We will supply 40 tonnes of bananas per week. The Indian subsidiary of Nader Ibrahim will set up cold storage and cleaning facilities at Jagadia," the Chairman of the Sri Narmada Farmers' Club, Mr Ajitsinh Parmar, said.

A team from the Philippines company spent two weeks at Jagadia, conducting soil and weather tests and found that the conditions for growing bananas were more suited at Jagadia than their own country. The company has nearly 5,000 acres of captive farms, Mr Parmar told Business Line.

The cost of production for the Philippines company at its own farms works out to be Rs 110 per 20 kg, while the Jagadia cooperative has committed to supply at Rs 92, he added.

The Narmada Farmers' Club, previously known as the Jagadia Farmers' Club, had been lying dormant for the last eight years. The District Development Officer of the National Bank for Rural and Agriculture Development (Nabard), Mr R.V. Dave, encouraged the farmers to revive the group and get into banana cultivation on a commercial scale.

"Within two years, the area has emerged as a major banana growing belt and now we have over 700 acres of banana cultivation. I have also suggested that the farmers' cooperative should register the `Narmada' brand," Mr Dave said.

The Narmada Farmers' Club is aiming even bigger. The farmers are not only working on the brand, but say that they could even explore selling the bananas under the `Narmada' brand in the international markets when the contract with Nader Ibrahim comes up for renewal after a year.

In that case, you may look out for `Narmada' bananas on your plate sometime in the future.

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