Adani’s predatory pricing causes apple prices for the growers to fall sharply in Himachal Pradesh
In an early demonstration of the harm that the Union government’s controversial agriculture laws—one of which incentivises corporates to buy from farmers from outside government-controlled mandis, and at prices determined by them—can do, the Adani Group’s low rates for the apples it is buying from farmers in Himachal Pradesh has caused a big fall in the prices of the fruit for growers across the state.
Apple growing supports over 1.7 lakh families in the state, and the apple business is worth Rs 5,000 crore. It makes up 85 per cent of Himachal Pradesh’s total horticulture produce.
Naturally, the plummeting prices have caused a hue and cry across the state.
This year, the Adani Group, a major corporate player in the apple market of the hilly state, has announced its buying rate as Rs 72 per kg, which is a full Rs 16 less than last year.
And this rate is for big apples with 100 per cent colour. For small and medium apples, which make up two-thirds of the production of an orchard, on an average, the company’s rate is less than Rs 60 per kg.
At this rate, produce of less than 60 per cent colour would be sold between Rs 12-15 per kg, whereas farmers’ cost of production is more than Rs 25-30 per kg, according to Lokinder Bisht, president of the Progressive Growers Association.
Further, Bisht said, before Adani announced its rate, the premium A-grade apple was being sold for Rs 80-90 per kg, at over Rs 2,000 per box. But the price crashed soon after Adani’s Rs 72 per kg announcement.
According to Harish Chauhan, president of the Apple, Vegetable and Flower Growers’ Association, small and medium farmers do not have the luxury of access to cold storages, and so have to sell at whatever the prevailing prices in the market are.
This kind of scenario, of predatory pricing destroying the livelihood of farmers, is exactly what has been predicted by many farmers, economists, other experts and politicians, and it has already started playing out.
For more than nine months, farmers from Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, and from other states as well, wo joined them later, farmers have been holding demonstrations at various border points in Delhi to urge the BJP-led Union government to withdraw the new agriculture laws, but to no avail.
It is important to note that Himachal Pradesh is also ruled by the BJP, and Gautam Adani and his company have for long had a rather cozy relationship with the BJP, courtesy Prime Minister Narendra Modi—first in Gujarat, where he was the chief minister for multiple terms, and now with the Union government.
Rajesh Dhanda, general secretary of the Himalayan Apple Growers Society, castigated the government, saying if the state government can give subsidies to Adani to set up cold storages, why cannot it give the same to small famers so that they can build cold storages and thus hold back their supplies, instead of having to be at the mercy of market forces all the time.
Many have accused the Adani Group of fleecing the apple growers.
It may also be noted that since 1984, successive state governments gave subsidies on insecticides, fungicides and other medicines, along with on agricultural equipment, to apple growers, but these were all discontinued by the BJP government.
