Date:11/01/2006 URL: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2006/01/11/stories/2006011101891900.htm

Back Mills decry short supply of ELS cotton — Poor seeds quality, labour costs worry growers

G. Gurumurthy

More textile mills participating in on-farm exercises would encourage spreading the awareness for the industry's needs among the cotton growers, especially in the promotion of ELS cotton whose shortage is a constant worry for the finer count yarn manufacturers.

Coimbatore , Jan. 10

THE on-going campaign by the Tamil Nadu cotton trade/textile mills for promoting awareness on extra long staple (ELS) cotton has brought into sharp focus the prevailing gaps in perception of cotton crop between the consuming textile industry and the growers.

While textile mills, the end users of raw cotton, are left tending in their own way the quality variations encountered by them in the cotton sold to them, the farmers remain bogged down by the non-availability of quality seeds and farm services in the area of technical guidance needed to optimise yield.

The dilemma of the cotton growers is further accentuated by the non-availability of farm labour to pick in time the cotton raised in their farms.

"Apart from the non-availability of ELS cotton, contamination of these cottons due to the varietal mix and the falling fibre characteristics below the quality norms needed by the spinners are the constraints facing the textile industry," says Mr Gopa Kumar, Managing Director of the city-based Chandra Textiles Ltd, one of the finer count yarn manufacturing companies in the region.

Mr Kumar said these issues could be adequately addressed by the textile mills only if they directly interact with the cotton growers emphasising on the quality requirements.

Mr Kumar and senior officials of his company, present at a cotton farmers' gathering at the South India Cotton Association's (SICA) model ELS cotton farm in the city, were also of the view that more textile mills participating in such on-farm exercises would encourage spreading the awareness on the industry's needs among the cotton growers, especially in the promotion of ELS cotton whose shortage is a constant worry for the finer count yarn manufacturers.

But at the same time, the worries of a group of cotton farmers from Avinashi near here, who were invited to visit the SICA model farm jointly promoted by Super Spinning Mills Ltd, are on two counts - non-availability of quality seeds and surging labour cost.

"Even as we feel handicapped in getting the required volume of quality seeds, we also need to get adequate guidance on correct farming methods while we are introduced to new varieties of seeds such as the Bt cotton," said Mr Palanisamy of Sengalipalayam village in the Avinashi block, who was part of the farmers' team that visited the SICA farm.

Farmers in Avinashi, once known as a DCH-32 cotton producing tract, have of late migrated to raising medium/short staple varieties such as LRA/Ranjit/Bunny which, according to the farmers, required less crop care in the face of water shortage, farm labour shortage.

"Avinashi block abutting the industrially active Tirupur and Coimbatore is witness to erosion in its farm labour as increasing demand for labour for industrial operation and higher wages offered by the industries have forced migration of farm labour," said the Avinashi farmers.

This has indirectly worked against Avinashi farmers raising long duration ELS cotton such as the DCH-32 forcing them to shift to lesser duration medium staple cotton varieties like LRA or Ranjit which come under the 120/130 days maturity cycle.

"Unlike neighbouring Karnataka where the soil fertility remains high to raise ELS cotton variety and lower farm labour cost, we in Avinashi have to spend minimum Rs 60 as per day wage per farm worker. The involvement of labour to tend the ELS cotton is crucial and this makes our cultivation cost high," the farmers added.