Despite a bumper harvest of watermelons in Kotalipara upazila of Gopalganj this year, fruits worth several crores of taka remain unsold at the local wholesale markets, putting the future of farmers there in jeopardy.
Local traders claimed that unlike every other year, the number of wholesalers travelling to the district to buy products was slim – mostly because of the political instability and the ongoing non-stop countrywide transport blockade.
As a result, watermelon farmers are choosing to leave their harvest on the field for a few extra days in the hope that the trend would turn in their favour; however, if the crop is left on the field for a couple more weeks, the risk of it rotting would also increase significantly.
Kotalipara upazila agriculture office sources said around 910 hectares of land in the area was used to cultivate a target of 120,000 tonnes of watermelons this year. Local farmers, meanwhile, claimed the total harvest would eventually exceed 150,000 tonnes.
With prospects gloomy for finding buyers for their watermelons, the farmers are worried about how they would be able to repay the loans they had taken from local banks, cooperatives, and NGOs to invest in this year’s harvest.
Narayan Chandra Biswas, a farmer in the Chitolia Beel area, told the Dhaka Tribune he had taken nearly Tk14 lakh in loan from the Directorate of Cooperatives to cultivate watermelons on 25 acres of field; however, all his hopes have now turned into frustration in the absence of buyers.
Monimohon Ballabh, a wholesaler in Kaliganj Bazar, claimed during this time every year, the market daily sold around Tk2-3 crore worth of watermelon, but this year, the number of wholesale buyers was only nominal.
Toha Mandal, a wholesale buyer who had been coming to Kaliganj from Kushtia to buy watermelons for the last ten years, admitted that the hartals and blockade had made other wholesalers like him fearful to make the trip this year.
Upazila Agriculture Officer Rathindranath Biswas, meanwhile, urged wholesalers from across the country to buy superior-quality watermelons from the markets of Kotalipara as it was more affordable than other places, while there were also banking facilities at the wholesale markets for the traders.