Orange orchards wilt
With Amravati receiving 43% less monsoon rain this year and temperatures soaring this month, growers say ensuring adequate water throughout the season has become increasingly difficult and expensive, while a host of other problems — rising input costs, uncertain market prices, crop insurance delays and wildlife damage — continue to deepen the crisis. The impact is already visible in the region’s famed Nagpur mandarin belt, where farmers claim orange trees have been removed from around 5,000 hectares as growers increasingly consider shifting to alternative crops requiring less water. The belt, spread across Chandur Bazar and adjoining areas, has around 35,000 hectares under orange orchards.
“Because of the lack of rainfall this year, orange growers are unable to plan how to irrigate their orchards. There is a strong possibility the next season may also be lost,” said farmer Shekhar Vighe of Dapori in Morshi taluka.
He said the current distress was the result of several years of economic and natural challenges, including low and uncertain market prices, rising costs of fertilisers, pesticides, labour, electricity, drip irrigation and orchard management, besides pest and disease attacks and weather fluctuations. The region is known for its relatively small-sized, tangy oranges. This year’s water crisis has, however, become the immediate concern. With inadequate rainfall and limited irrigation sources, farmers are struggling to plan irrigation for their orchards. Even power supply from transformers is unreliable.