The Central Arecanut and Cocoa Marketing and Processing Cooperative (Campco) will coordinate with other arecanut cooperatives to procure arecanut from growers and to bring stability in the market affected by the lockdown in the country, according to SR Satishchandra, President of Campco.

Speaking to BusinessLine after holding a virtual meeting with growers through a video streaming app on Thursday evening, he said farmers spoke about various issues facing them and also gave some valuable suggestions to the cooperative.

Referring to his interactions with grower-members, he said Campco has been coordinating with other arecanut cooperatives in Karnataka to help growers. He said Campco began purchasing arecanut from farmers in select centres on April 13. Now the Sirsi-based areca cooperative TSS Ltd has also come forward to buy the commodity.

He said Campco is in talks with arecanut cooperatives in Shivamogga and Tumakuru to start procurement from growers. “We are coordinating with other arecanut cooperatives to bring stability in the market,” he said, adding that Campco’s intervention has helped in setting the base price for the commodity at ₹250 a kg. Prior to Campco procuring arecanut from growers, some private traders were making attempts to procure the commodity below that price. This had created panic among growers, he said.

Virtual meeting

Growers from different parts of Karnataka and Kerala attended the virtual meeting on Thursday evening. The meeting, which was scheduled for one hour, went beyond 90 minutes. Deviprasad, a grower from Punacha village of Dakshina Kannada district, asked the Campco president to allow the purchase of arecanut primary agricultural cooperative societies.

Avinash M, grower from Alankar village, and Jayaprakashnarayana T, a grower from Manjeshwar of Kasaragod district in Kerala, urged the cooperative to increase the number of days of procurement and the number of procurement centres.

Answering their queries, Satishchandra said the cooperative is interacting with the authorities concerned on these issues. He said he is hopeful of some good outcome in this matter.

Also read www.thehindubusinessline.com/economy/agri-business/campco-to-conduct-virtual-meet-of-growers-through-zoom-app/article31337056.ece

Representing growers from the red arecanut belt, Lingaraju KS of Davangere district, and Ventaktesh of Tumakuru, sought Campco’s help in procuring red arecanut variety also.

Replying to them, Campco President said the cooperative is coordinating with other arecanut cooperatives such as TSS in Sirsi, Mamcos in Shivamogga, and Tumcos in Tumakuru in this regard. TSS has already began procurement from growers, he said.

Thanking the cooperative for conducting such a virtual meeting to bring confidence among growers, Mahesh Puchhappady, General Secretary of All-India Areca Growers’ Association, wanted to know Campco’s plans to supply copper sulphate to its member-growers. (Copper sulphate solution is sprayed in arecanut plantations to protect the plants from fruit rot disease.)

To this, Satishchandra said the cooperative had ordered for 200 tonnes of copper sulphate this year. Two loads of copper sulphate have already reached the cooperative’s godown, and it is working on getting the remaining quantities.

The cooperative had sold 170 tonnes of copper sulphate at subsidised rates to the growers in the last season, he added.

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