The National Agrarian Unity organisation has noted that farmers are in need of machinery from the Agriculture Ministry, besides aid, to restart paddy cultivation.
Speaking to The Daily Morning, the organisation’s President, Anuradha Tennakoon said that it’s impossible to restart cultivation in some fields with the provided allowance. “The fields which are submerged by sand, stones and gravel are impossible to use for cultivation again without removing them using machinery. This is an expensive programme and sometimes, to restore just an acre would cost approximately Rs. 300,000. Especially in Deduru Oya, Ampara, Batticaloa, Vavuniya, Anuradhapura, Horowpathana, and Polonnaruwa, there are fields that are severely damaged”. He further said that, “The Government provides an allowance of Rs. 150,000 per hectare under the condition that the farmer is to restore cultivation again. There are many fields where paddy was grown and now the season has come to an end. Hence, they can’t be cultivating paddy, and at the same time, it is visible that to start cultivation again, the farmer can’t get rid of the sand in the fields by himself. For some fields, one might need to bring mud from outside as they have been totally washed away. For this, the Ministry might need to provide the machinery of the Irrigation Department and the Agrarian Development Department”.
He further raised the concern of seed paddy. “We don’t even have seed paddy for this season. We hope the Ministry has a programme to grow them locally for the farmers under these circumstances. By now, almost all the seeds are imported from Malaysia. Those seeds are not suited to the climate and identical circumstances in our country. If the Agricultural Department is going to import the seed paddy by any chance amidst this disaster, we are totally against that. We hope the Ministry has already taken action to produce seed paddy for all the local farmers for the next season. We have enough resources to execute this programme, but there is no plan or process as such from the Ministry.”
Attempts to contact the Ministry regarding the allegations proved futile.