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KOCHI: Making a strong plea to the Union Government to lift the blanket ban on export of rice, farmers from Palakkad on Wednesday said organic rice should be equated with Basmati rice and allowed to be exported.

Since the Centre banned export of all rice except Basmati, farmers belonging to the Vadakkancherry Padasekhara Samithi (VPS) were anxious, as 28 out of the 44 farmers in the samithi depended on organic cultivation for their livelihood.

“Our income security has been hit. With great difficulty we produce quality rice. But the ban on rice export has hit us hard. We need the export market,” Mr R N Ramakrishnan, treasurer of the samithi said.

Organic rice cannot be equated with normal rice. The farmers have incurred additional expenses to cultivate organic rice and if it is not allowed to export due to the ban, the farmers will incur huge loss, Mr Ramakrishnan, a former Bank of Baroda employe e, said.

VPS is looking at European market for export of organic rice. Organic rice will fetch three times the price of ordinary rice in the export market, he added. “Due to recession there is a drop in demand for organic rice in the European market. But the dema nd will soon increase,” Mr R N Sankaran, Samithi Vice-President said, adding that there were plans to patent the organic rice.

If the organic rice is subsidised, it can be sold in the domestic market. Besides improving the yield, it has become more resistant to pest attack and water usage has also come down considerably, Mr Ramakrishnan said. - PTI

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