Shameem Reza Dafrul, Gobindaganj (Gaibandha)

Although farmers in Gobindaganj, Gaibandha are happy with the super bumper potato harvest, potato farmers in this area are in extreme trouble for not being able to store potatoes in cold storage. There are still many potatoes in the field - which will be suitable for harvesting in a few days.

Although the farmers have decided to store potatoes, a group of unscrupulous officials, employees of the cold storage and local brokers and farmers have snatched the advance potato storage cards, so the real farmers are disappointed because they are not able to store potatoes.

According to sources from the Gobindaganj Upazila Agriculture Office, the target of potato cultivation in the upazila this time was 6,104 hectares of land. But cultivation has been done on 9,318 hectares of land. Potatoes have been cultivated on almost one and a half times more land than the target. Due to favorable weather conditions and the absence of pest and disease attacks, there has been a bumper crop of potatoes. And from this, there is a possibility of producing about 4.5 lakh metric tons of potatoes.

There are 4 cold storages in Gobindaganj Upazila to store the produced potatoes: Gobindaganj Cold Storage-1, Himadri Limited, Gobindaganj Cold Storage-2 in Suryagadi, and Apex Agriscience Limited in Madanpur. 36,500 metric tons of potatoes can be stored in these cold storages. As a result, most of the potatoes produced by farmers will remain out of storage. Without the opportunity to store them, farmers will be forced to sell their field potatoes in the market - and this is likely to reduce the price of potatoes. As a result, farmers will suffer losses.
Although the price of early varieties of potatoes was somewhat better in the beginning, the price of potatoes is decreasing day by day. Currently, potatoes are being sold at a price of 380 to 450 taka per head.

Last year, the closed storage authority increased the rent for storing potatoes by 50 taka to 350 taka on the pretext of electricity bills. This year, the closed storage association has again fixed the rent at 8 taka per kg. In this, the rent for a 65 kg sack of potatoes will be 520 taka. Advance booking cards have to be taken at 50 taka. The cold storage authority says that last year, a sack of potatoes that was kept at 65 to 66 kg will now be kept at 50 kg.

Farmers in front of the Gobindaganj Himadri closed storage said that on the one hand, since the price of potatoes is low, they are unable to sell them in the current market to cover half of the cost, so they are forced to try to store potatoes in cold storage. Even there, despite the increase in the rent of the cold storage and standing in long lines to get a booking card for storing potatoes in the cold storage, they are frustrated that they did not get the card.

The Himadri authority started issuing potato booking cards on February 15 and finished issuing booking cards in three days on February 18. Farmers claim that the cold storage authorities have colluded to give potato storage cards to the hoarders in advance. As a result, ordinary potato farmers have been deprived of getting potato storage cards in the cold storage. However, thousands of sacks of potatoes from traders and hoarders are entering the cold storage every day and night in trucks and trolleys. This scene is now prevalent in front of every cold storage.

On the spot, it is seen that farmers are coming one after another to collect potato storage booking cards. But they are going back without getting the cards. Farmers complain that the real farmers have not been able to collect potato storage cards. And this will force the farmers to sell their produced potatoes as soon as they are picked from the fields. They will not be able to store seed potatoes for the next season.

On February 18, hundreds of potato farmers, who were not able to get potato booking cards due to the manipulation of the business syndicate at Himadri Cold Storage in Gobindaganj, blocked the main gate of the cold storage and blocked the Dhaka-Rangpur highway in front of the cold storage for about an hour and a half.

Farmer Helal Sarkar of Ballya village in Shakhahar Union has now cultivated potatoes on six acres of land. After receiving news of the shortage of potato booking cards, he contacted the authorities of some cold storages. But he could not arrange any cards. Last Saturday morning, he complained that the cold storage authorities had sold potato booking cards not to real farmers, but only to stockholders and traders. As a result, farmers in the area are not getting the opportunity to store potatoes in the cold storage. As a result, they will face huge losses by cultivating potatoes this time.

Mozammel Haque, manager of Himadri Cold Storage Limited, said that the booking cards have run out. Last year, the traders who stored potatoes in our cold storage have also been given booking cards this time.

However, the amount is much less. There is no rule for selling booking cards on the black market.

Gobindaganj Cold Storage Manager Sajib said, this year we are giving priority to local farmers. We are not giving any cards to stockpilers. If farmers bring 5 to 10 sacks of potatoes, there will be no problem storing them in the cold storage. He also said, the capacity of our two cold storages is about 3.5 lakh sacks. So far, 1 lakh 20 thousand sacks of potatoes have been booked.

In this regard, Gobindaganj UNO Syeda Yasmin Sultana said, regular monitoring is being done so that farmers can store their produced potatoes in the cold storage.

The Cold Storage Owners Association told The Country Today that there is enough space in their cold storages. There will be no problem for farmers to store seed potatoes. Booking cards cannot be sold on the black market or transferred to anyone. Legal action will be taken against anyone who manipulates the storage of excess potatoes.