A new forum “Uzhavan” (farmer in Tamil) has been formed by farmers to exclusively sell turmeric. The forum held its first auction on Thursday evening.
At the sale, 350 bags of turmeric offered on sale. The Salem Hybrid finger variety fetched a maximum price of Rs 11,100 a quintal.
The hybrid root variety fetched a maximum price of Rs 7,129.
The Erode finger variety was sold at Rs 8,261 while the root variety was sold at Rs 6,812. D. Venkateshwaran, Vice-President of the Uzhavan fourm, said that they have arranged the sale of ‘graded’ turmeric. They are arranging to clean turmeric and then grade it before putting up for sale. They are charging Re 1 for a kg for cleaning, processing and packing. A commission of 1.5 per cent is collected as commission for sale.
A few local traders participated in the auction.
Venkateshwaran said that the sale would be held every Thursday in a ‘transparent’ system.