Loose threads: Sericulture in Karnataka sees emerging threats

Rising input and labour costs, pest management and low import taxes weigh heavy on silk growers and reelers

Sidlaghatta/Ramanagara: The average size of agricultural landholdings in Ramanagara and Chikkaballapur, two districts that border the swelling city of Bengaluru, is less than one hectare. Despite their small size, in concert, these farms produce about 130 tonnes of cocoons every single day. Together, the two districts are the largest contributors to Karnataka’s harvest of raw silk.

It is no wonder that in Hittalahalli, a village with 250 households in Chikkaballapur, there is a near-uniform devotion to sericulture. “Almost 100% of these farmers were involved in sericulture in some capacity earlier,” says H G Gopala Gowda, a sericulturist from the village. 

The accolades are many. India is the world’s leading consumer and the second-largest producer of raw silk. Karnataka contributes over 43% to the country’s harvest. As a result, several processes in the sericulture production and processing ecosystem have become fully articulated. In 2024 alone, 39,000 MT of raw silk was produced, according to data from the Central Silk Board. 

Five years ago, the first signs of a shift in momentum started to appear. Today, the signs are glaring —  the red soil of the region is marred. Several mulberry plants lay strewn, freshly uprooted. “The perennial plants have become the target of many sicknesses over the last five years. This has halved yield at the farm level. There have been times when the silkworm larvae do not have enough feed due to pest attacks,” Gowda says.

Farmers now dread a roulette of attacks, from pink mealy bugs, thrips, cutworms and whiteflies, to afflictions like root rot, powdery mildew, leaf spot and leaf rust disease. Changes in atmospheric conditions, extreme heat and rainfall events have also damaged silkworm health, causing a reduction in yields. 

The changes have inspired unease. Employing over 97 lakh people in India, and 60 lakh people in Karnataka, sericulture is one of the most profitable agrarian avenues. About 56% of the total revenue generated from the sale of silk products goes to farmers.

People employed in the sericulture industry cannot deny the emerging paradoxical phenomena. Even though sericulture provides assured income, climate change and changing market dynamics have posed a considerable threat. 

In Sidlaghatta, a nerve centre of silk production, the number of sericulture farmers has dipped from 6,750 in 2021 to 6,237 in 2024. Gowda explains that the number is likely to further decline as climatic uncertainties intensify.  

Reeling, another profession within the raw silk ecosystem, has similarly witnessed a steady decline in traditional practitioners. Silk reeling, or filature, involves extracting fibre filaments from cocoons to produce silk thread — a process that demands considerable skill. 

In Ramanagara, tagged the ‘Silk City’, the number of reelers has more than halved in the past three years, dropping from approximately 3,200 to just 1,019, according to the Reelers Welfare Association, Ramanagara.

Shifting patterns

Silkworm rearing is acutely time-sensitive, with the life cycle from seed to cocoon to market being contained within the frame of one month. 

A silkworm seed hatches into larvae in about 10 days, and in a fortnight, the larvae begin to build their cocoons of lustrous silk, and are ready for transport to the cocoon markets.

“There is an assured market during most months, and this provides some stability,” explains Shivakumar, a farmer with four acres of land under mulberry cultivation.   

Equally integral to the health of silkworms is the quality of the mulberry leaf, the sole source of food for Bivoltine and crossbreed, two breeds of silkworm reared in Karnataka. A study published in 1958 highlights the diverse factors contributing to a successful cocoon crop, attributing the largest influence to mulberry leaf quality (38%), closely followed by climatic conditions (37%). 

Of late, it is leaf quality that has come under the onslaught of cutworms, stem borers and thrips. “The harvest of the crop is affected by these pests. The leaves become dry and shrunken. The size of the leaves is affected,” says N Siddalingaswamy, a scientist from the moriculture division of the Karnataka State Sericulture Research and Development Institute (KSSRDI). 

The connection between climate change and pest attacks, suspected to be linked for a long time, is being corroborated by several studies. For instance, a 2018 study published in the Asian Journal of Biological Sciences estimates that the average damage caused by pests and pathogens is estimated to be 34.24% of mulberry yield, resulting in a loss of approximately 4,500 kg per hectare each year.

The consequences of this are already plain to see. The stages of development are stretching out. “Silkworm larvae are taking more time to touch adulthood because of the quality of mulberry being provided. The delay can range from 10-15 days between stages,” says a farmer from Kanakapura in Ramanagara.  

Several larvae fail to build cocoons when supplied with mulberry leaves affected by fungal pathogens like the leaf rust disease. “The larvae swell up to the required size but because the nutritional quality has been affected, they become hard but do not build cocoons. When there is an outbreak of pests and diseases, there is significant wastage,” says Gowda.  

Pest management

The increase in pests and diseases has had a domino effect on the economic feasibility of silkworm rearing. In the past, “most sericulturists held back from using pesticides and mostly depended on organic pest control methods,” says Venkataswamy Reddy, the head of a farmer producer organisation in Sidlaghatta. Of late, there are considerable additional input costs dedicated to pest management. 

The silkworm is an insect too, points out Chikkaballapura-based farmer Ramanjanappa. For more than a decade, he has grown mulberry plants on his land in Sidlaghatta but has recently reduced the area under the crop. “Pest management with harsh chemicals will kill silkworms too. We have to be careful and only use prescribed controllers like Kavach and Dithane that have been formulated to avoid harming the worms,” Ramanjanappa says. 

Profit margins have been narrowing for years. While a kilogram of the crossbreed variety of silkworm cocoons can fetch up to Rs 650, input costs have risen to Rs 500 per kg.

Delays in the supply chain have also become common lately. The use of pesticides means swelling harvest times for mulberry foliage — the food cannot be supplied to the larvae until 20 days after pesticide application. Rising labour costs have also contributed to growing frustration among sericulturists. 

Even farmers who shift to other crops cause a cascading effect, with neighbouring farms switching too. 

Standing just a few kilometres from the Sidlaghatta market (one of Asia’s largest cocoon markets), Ramanjanappa points to the green shade nets that protect tomatoes, marigolds, chrysanthemums and a few other vegetables. “Now, neighbouring farms will also have to stop growing the mulberry plant. After farmers started using power sprayers in pesticide application, chemicals spread to other fields too,” he says. 

A 2016 field survey conducted among 120 farmers in Ramanagara, Chikkaballapur and Kolar districts underscores the effects of indirect chemical pollution. In about 56% of cases, sericulture farmers weathered the impact of pesticide drift. In these cases, the silkworms displayed concerning behaviour, including constructing thin-shelled cocoons and adult larvae vomiting a yellow liquid before dying. 

This leads to a ripple effect, with farms nearby shifting to the cultivation of other crops. 

Research and development 

Although the application of pesticides and managing the effects of climate change have made the practice of sericulture more complicated, solution-oriented research has been limited. “We need field officers who are able to understand the problems that we face at the grassroots level. Awareness programmes and spot inspections have dwindled,” says Gowda.  

Complaints to the department and district administration are rarely addressed and there remains a rift between research and the implementation of solutions to pest attacks, adds Ramanjanappa. 

An official at the KSSRDI attributes this to large-scale staff shortages. “We have tried our best to respond to crises as they appear. In the absence of field inspectors, senior scientists and high-ranking officials conduct spot inspections. The institute is trying to respond to farmer demands but there is a significant staff shortage at both the department of sericulture and the research and development institute, and this has impacted the urgency with which an issue is addressed,” he says. 

According to data gleaned from the Department of Sericulture, Government of Karnataka, out of a sanctioned strength of 4,299, a total of 2,723 positions were vacant in 2021. “The sanctioned strength of the department was later revised, but there was a delay in filling positions even after the revision,” admits the official. The workforce in the department was capped at 2,695 in 2022. Even then, 49% of positions remained vacant. 

The organisation of field visits has been impacted most by the department’s diminished capacity. “The government recently conducted one round of recruitment of officers and is looking to address these issues,” the official adds. 

Fractures in the market 

Similarly ineffective is the presence of the Karnataka Silk Marketing Board Limited (KSMBL), a public-sector organisation that, by design, is intended to regulate price variations in the market. This is to ensure that the interests of reelers, as key stakeholders, are sufficiently protected. 

According to a recent Comptroller Auditor General report, the KSMBL has a negative net worth of Rs 17.79 crore, causing many to question its efficacy. “There is a need for a competent marketing body given the size of the silk markets in the state,” says Parvez Pasha, president of the Silk Reelers Welfare Association, Ramanagara.

Reelers purchase cocoons from markets and process them in a cottage industry setting. The process demands finesse and involves the cleaning, boiling and unwinding of silk thread.

In recent years, the market has spun out of control. “Though we are significant stakeholders in the silk manufacturing industry, we receive few benefits and the market is mostly unregulated. Now, several large players have entered the market and they control prices,” says Pasha. 

The association has pushed for an organised, regulated market for raw silk, similar to cocoon markets in Ramanagara and Sidlaghatta. Presently, there has been an upsurge of middlemen who buy from reelers and sell the raw material to twisters, traders and weavers at inflated prices. Before an Amendment to the Central Silk Board Act in 2005, silk exchanges were regulated in reeling centres, and reelers suggest this as an alternative. 

The competition 

Woven primarily from mulberry silk, are the eponymous sarees of Kanchipuram. A popular choice for brides in south India, most of the thread used for weaving the sarees is sourced from Ramanagara and Chikkaballapur. 

V K Damodaran of the Kanchipuram Silk Saree Manufacturers Association says they source silk thread from Sidlaghatta in Karnataka. “Silk yarn is available in places like Gobichettipalayam in Tamil Nadu, but we procure from Sidlaghatta, due to its quality,” he added. 

Despite this reputation, the demand for Chinese silk thread persists. “Even with an 18% duty on imported Chinese thread, there is a demand for it because prices are higher in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu,” says Damodaran. There is a difference of Rs 500 to Rs 550 per kg of raw silk purchased from China and India.

Reelers worry that this easy availability of Chinese imports will collapse a teetering market. “Currently, there are very few import taxes. This has encouraged the use of Chinese silk thread. The lack of duties also impacts prices,” says Mohammed Tanzeem, joint secretary of the Silk Reelers Welfare Association, Ramanagara.

The anti-dumping duty, which was renewed in 2016, expired in 2021. This tax is imposed by a government on imported silk from another country, when it is considered to be sold at an unfairly low price. “The tax is important to protect domestic markets. As the largest producer of raw silk, China has the power to offer raw silk at low prices,” says Devinder Sharma, a food and agriculture policy expert. In total, India imported 2,650 MT of raw silk from China in 2024 to meet domestic demand.  

Many experts vouch for India’s potential to overtake China to be the largest producer of raw silk. China has seen a downturn in raw silk production over the past five years. Reports reveal output has plummeted from 1.7 lakh tonnes in 2015 to a mere 50,000 tonnes by 2022 — a shift that underscores the changing dynamics of the global silk industry. 

“This is India’s golden opportunity to invest in post-cocoon technology that will help process the silk waste. The government should provide these technologies to reelers, so we can match international equipment and quality,” says Janardhan, a reeler with automatic reeling machines. “Providing subsidies on the machines and also carving out a well-defined export pathway could encourage the growth of the industry and provide access to fair, remunerative prices,” he adds. 

The silk industry, today, stands at a crossroads, pressed by challenges posed by climate change, pests and market volatility. “Apart from silk-producing hubs in Karnataka, many sericulturists have abandoned the profession and one can see that there is not that much importance being given to this,” says Sharma. In India’s journey to becoming the world’s largest silk producer, it is integral that policy supports farmers across different regions. 

While the resilience of farmers and reelers has kept the industry afloat, there are several signs that point to the need for interventions in research, pest management, market regulation and technological development. Without timely intervention, Karnataka’s thriving silk industry faces the risk of unravelling.

(With inputs from E T B Sivapriyan in Chennai)