Thanking  for hindu to bring google social probelm realted to agrobusiness 

http://www.blonnet.com/life/2007/01/12/stories/2007011200040100.htm copy right:rasheeda@thehindu.co.in

The labour crysis and sugar cane  globalised    world business  problems 

Sugar cane can be better than rice production in south india 

Copy righ :rasheeda@thehindu.co.in

Rasheeda Bhagat

The green revolution made us self-sufficient in food but I foresee a time when we will have to import food again because generally agriculture is not so profitable, and labour shortage is increasing.

After a long, long time it was a delight to meet Indian farmers with positive stories to tell...

Whether it was a larger farmer like Radhakrishnan, who along with his two brothers' families owns 180 acres in Cuddalore district about 80 acres in cane cultivation; or Bala Ravi, a woman farmer owning just three acres, the farmers we met in the sugarcane cultivation command region of E.I.D. Parry's factory in Nellikuppam, Tamil Nadu, greeted us with a smile.

The reasons for their smiles are evident pretty soon; compared to paddy or some other crops cane cultivation is more profitable because there are fewer uncertainties, it is relatively less labour intensive, the farmers are assured that all their produce will be absorbed by the sugar company in the command region, and in several ways the sugar division of E.I.D. Parry has done a lot of handholding for the 20,000-odd farmers who supply cane to its factory. This includes access to bank credit, insurance for crop inputs, cane-related information on various aspects of cutting, transportation, etc.

But of course everything is not hunky dory all the way. Interaction with farmers on their livelihood once again reinforces the fact that agriculture in India is becoming less and less attractive as a livelihood option, and most of those who continue in it have no other option, skills or wherewithal to switch professions.

When you ask M. Arunachalam, who owns 40 acres in Pagandai village, about 18 km from Cuddalore, whether he has any problems in cane cultivation, the agricultural graduate (from Madras Agriculture College, 1955), who speaks flawless English, replies in Tamil: "

Kashtam illatha vivasayam kidayadu

. The biggest problem is shortage of labour. We have a problem in getting female labour and I guarantee you that after 10 years you won't find them at all. We pay Rs 50-60 for half a day's work. But from Pondicherry they send vehicles to transport women to biscuit factories where they get similar daily wages. But the attraction is that they can sit comfortably in the shade and work; and they prefer this to toiling under the sun."

Waning agri income

"The green revolution made us self-sufficient in food but I foresee a time when we will have to import food again because generally agriculture is not so profitable, and labour shortage is increasing." Adds the agriculturist with irritation: "You never know what new land ceiling law the government might bring in to usurp a chunk of your land; today I might own so many acres, tomorrow, the story could be different."

Arunachalam gets about 40 tonnes of cane per acre, and Rs 8,000 profit per acre, "but a smaller farmer could get up to Rs 15,000 per acre as the labour input comes from his family". For a smaller farmer with three acres, this would mean less than Rs 4,000 income per month.

Is this enough? "That depends on your needs, but you have to remember that he grows his own food; a part of his land will be used for paddy and he'd grow some vegetables too."

Radhakrishnan, in Kozhipakkam village, says these days even for the biggest farmers, agricultural income has to be supplemented by business income. "It can give you food, but you cannot send your child abroad for education; you cannot become a

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crorepathi

through agriculture." The youngsters in this joint family are in various business enterprises ranging from floor tiles and power looms to readymade garments.

His land gives him income of Rs 10,000-15,000 per acre and he loves what he's doing but says: "There is no agriculture without pain; take any crop, you have to nurse it like a child, and handling labour is not easy. And now labour shortage has begun as people prefer jobs in factories or daily wages rather than work in fields."

From farming to IT

It doesn't come as a surprise that whether it is Arunachalam, Radhakrishnan, or Ramu, another farmer owning 8 acres in a nearby village, their sons and grandsons are qualified computer engineers working either abroad or in larger cities like Delhi or Chennai. While Arunachalam's grandson works with Accenture in Ireland (with whom he chats though a Web camera, a part of his computer ensemble as a Parry's Corner franchisee), Radhakrishnan's nephew runs an IT business in the US and Ramu's son works in Delhi, getting a salary of Rs 47,000 a month.

(`Parry's Corner' is an Internet hub in the farmer's house; here farmers can check on the status of their loans, unloading from their tractors at the E.I.D. Parry factory, and get other cane-related information).

So aren't youngsters moving away from their land to more alluring professions? After all, isn't the comfort and glitter of the big cities, foreign lands more tempting than village life?

With a half-smile Radhakrishnan says, "Fine, let them go, but in retirement they will come back here. I just can't stand Chennai; look at the noise, pollution and traffic. There is no water, stench everywhere and will you get breeze like this? Can we sit and talk like this... is it peaceful like this?"

But Ramu is more pragmatic; he put together a whopping Rs 31 lakh to buy a ground of land on the East Coast Road in Chennai a few months ago for his son to build a house. Interestingly, the Rs 31 lakh land kitty saw a contribution of Rs 15 lakh from his savings, Rs 5 lakh each from his sons, and loans from a bank and his wife's sister.

So would he live in Chennai some day?

"Oh no, I'll breathe my last here."

But while rooted to their village life, these agriculturists have not compromised on their comfort. While Arunachalam has replaced his electric heater with a boiler for which he uses coconut husk as fuel and connected the water supply to his taps to cut down on electricity, he can't do without an air-conditioner in summer, and Radhakrishnan has a Ford Ikon parked in his compound. Ramu doesn't own a fridge because "we don't eat leftover food, but I can buy it tomorrow if I want!"

The gender divide

The conveniences of modern living have not escaped them either. Arunachalam is sore with his wife Gowri for rearing four cows at home. "She gets up at 4 a.m. to supervise the milking, and we have to sell the surplus milk at Rs 8 a litre; you pay more to buy a litre of water. I tell her we can buy a packet of milk and be done with it, but she talks about Hindu tradition! And I have to grow paddy on three acres of my land not for the rice I can buy fine quality rice from a store but to get straw for feeding the cows!"

But we also notice that neither Gowri nor Lakshmi will sit down before their men, and Bala Ravi, the woman farmer, follows suit, preferring to be interviewed standing! Some things remain constant in villages.

She got farming rights to her mother's land as she has no brother and her sister lives far away. But the woman who will not sit before men has quietly transformed her husband's life. R. Mouttou Coumarane, Deputy Manager (Agri-Projects), E.I.D. Parry, says initially her husband didn't work but she organised a bank loan for a tractor and now he drives it, renting it out to other farmers for transporting cane or other work. All the framers we talked to had mobile phones; a third of the 20,000 Parry farmers own mobile phones.

Bala has to work hard to ensure the land yields an income of Rs 15,000 per acre, but does face problems in getting labour. "It's a little awkward for a woman to ask men to work on her field, but I manage," she shrugs. Coumarane adds that she commutes on a cycle to her land, and no longer are eyebrows raised at this.

Mechanisation the key

The farmers are happy at the rate of Rs 1,026 (this year) that E.I.D. Parry gives them per tonne of cane. "We don't want more in terms of price, but the government needs to do more to ensure that the produce per acre goes up, and our input cost in terms of fertilisers, pesticide, etc comes down," says Arunachalam, adding that mechanisation is the only answer to this. "Weeds are a big problem in cane cultivation and I have now resorted to modern methods of weeding and this has cut my cost by half."

Radhakrishnan wants more government support and says that 30 per cent of the subsidy meant for farmers is eaten away in corruption. He is angry that "people resent farmers getting free electricity. First of all how can you call it `free'? Don't factories such as Parry pay taxes to the government, and by supplying our produce to them don't we contribute in sugar factories making money and paying taxes on profits? So aren't we contributing in those taxes," are his valid questions that deserve a reply.

Profitable partnership

One of the oldest sugar factories in India, the sugar division of E.I.D. Parry was started by the East India Distilleries (hence the initials EID) and in 1983 the Murugappa group took it over. It produces 5,500 tonnes of sugar a day. M. Krishnan, DGM, Cane Operations, estimates that about 10-15 per cent of the irrigated farming land in Tamil Nadu is under sugarcane cultivation and "if you take productivity (not recovery) Tamil Nadu is number one in the world at 110 tonnes per hectare. This is because of climatic and soil conditions including micro nutrients."

When you note that cane farmers in the region seem to be much better off than those growing paddy, he says, "We work very closely with our farmers. From seed to harvest we take care of them as children. From supply of seeds, fertilisers, insurance and bank loans to saving the crop from pests, harvesting and transport of cane, we support farmers. Our R&D wing is constantly looking at new varieties of cane, soil conservation and how to improve their yield."

Ramu says if he owns 8 acres today, "it is thanks to E.I.D. Parry. By supporting me throughout, they made it possible for me to grow the 2 acres I had inherited from my father to 8 acres. Because they give guarantees, we get bank loans at 9 per cent; some people in our villages borrow from moneylenders at 60 per cent! The best part is that we get our payment in 15 days."

V. Jayachandran is another such beneficiary. A Parry's Corner franchisee he began with 10 acres and now owns 15 acres, but also grows cane on an additional 35 acres. He is also a distributor for Parry fertiliser, runs a PCO and an ice-cream shop (his outlet is on the main road to Cuddalore) and makes extra money during weekends by using his Internet facility as a cyber café. "Children come to play games and youngsters come for e-mail and chatting."

Coumarane explains that originally the company had given franchise for Parry's Corner to 22 farmers. "We arranged bank loans of Rs 48,000 for them to buy the computer, printer, etc and gave them free modems and connectivity. But in smaller villages many of them were unable to run the Internet service profitably so we bought back the computers at the actual price, and we now run the service linking all cane activities on the Net.

"We've tied up with ICICI and Indian Bank to help farmers get loans speedily. We try our best to ensure that the farmer doesn't lose in any way by partnering with us."

K. Raghunandan, President of the Sugar division of E.I.D. Parry, has the last word when he says: "In the hype about IT, outsourcing and BPOs, people forget that we are an agrarian society and agro-based industries have a great relevance in this country. If we can get our act together, these can become great tools for socio-economic development."

Response may be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in

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