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NEW DELHI: “Tomato King” Ramesh Pangal, a farmer in the north Indian state of Haryana, had a good yield despite a heatwave that began earlier than usual this summer. By May, the tomatoes he had grown on 21 hectares (52 acres) after taking a loan of $22,000 were red, ripe and ready to be harvested.
The wholesale price of tomatoes had been depressed for the past eight months, but Pangal, who has won several awards and earned the grand “Tomato King” epithet for using technology to modernize farming in his region, was hoping the prices would stabilize.
They didn’t and after accounting for labor costs, all he got was 1.24 rupees (1 cent) per kilogram, which didn’t cover his cost of production even.
By the middle of May, when farmers in the central Indian state of Maharashtra began dumping their yield on roads and in fields because the meagre 2-3 rupees [2.5-3.5 cents] per kilogram they were being offered at the wholesale markets was not enough to cover even their cost of transporting the tomatoes, Pangal joined in.
“The irony is that when I started tomato cultivation in 2007 on about 100 acres, the wholesale price was around 4-5 rupees (4.9-6 cents). Since then labor costs have gone up three-fold. The cost of transportation which was 60-70 paisa (less than a cent) per kilogram in 2007, is now 2-2.50 rupees (2.5-3 cents) per kilogram. The bag of manure that I used to buy for 200 rupees ($2.43) now costs 1,350 rupees ($16.41) but the wholesale price of tomatoes in May was 2-3 rupees (2.5-3.5 cents),” Pangal said.
For 10 days, starting May 25, he drove a tractor in his fields, turning almost half his standing crop of tomatoes into mulch.
Farmers across India either destroyed or abandoned their crops. What was left was wrecked by torrential rains in mid-June, leading to a sudden shortage of tomatoes, a staple in Indian kitchens. This pushed up prices and by July tomatoes were retailing for 200 rupees ($2.43) per kilogram, even 250 rupees ($3.04) and more in some cities.
While this nearly 1,500 percent increase over a few weeks upset household budgets and restaurant menus, some farmers like Eshwar Gayakar in Maharashtra were experiencing a season of reward after years of debt and distress.
“I sold my crop of tomatoes for $462,100 this year,” he said.
