Reduced yield worries farmers

The Agricultural Department had made an official announcement that groundnut had been sown in 6,000 hectares of land during the current season in the taluk.

However, the crop has been destroyed in most of the areas due to drought conditions in the taluk.

Groundnut is the major oilseed of India and Karnataka. The southwest monsoon is the most important factor that determines the area sown, production and prices.

The groundnut belongs to the pea and bean family and is a legume. The groundnut is the only nut that grows below the earth. The groundnut plant is a variable annual herb, which grows upto 50 cm in height. The flowers of the plant develop a stalk which enters into the soil, forms a pod containing generally two seeds. They become mature in about two months, when the leaves of the plant turn yellow.

The plant is then removed from the earth and allowed to dry. After three to six weeks they are separated from the plant.The groundnut is particularly valued for its protein contents. India is one of the major exporting country of groundnuts after china.

If each groundnut plant yields 20 to 30 pods (shells) of nuts then cultivation becomes remunerative, says Manjunath, a groundnut farmer of Doddabandahalli.

However, this time it is difficult to find even five good pods in a plant. This year, the Agricultural Department had distributed superior quality of groundnut seeds for sowing along with subsidised fertilizer and pesticide.

However, the groundnut yield has declined due to untimely rainfall, say Venkatappa and Rajappa. Groundnut is a prominent commercial crop and its low yield has disappointed the farmers. The groundnuts yielded so far is also not of a good quality.

Groundnut has been harvested in nearly 50 per cent of the area. In another 10 days, groundnut will be completely harvested. Disappointed by  the low yield, some farmers have decided not to harvest the crop.

General Secretary of the Kisan Sabha M Gopal has demanded a scientific compensation for the loss of groundnut crop.