In Chapainawabganj, wholesalers (arotdars) are holding farmers hostage and buying mangoes at 52–54 kg to the maund. By that reckoning, farmers have to give away one-fifth of the district's mangoes for free, a share estimated to be worth Tk 500 crore.

In Rajshahi and Naogaon districts, too, mango farmers are being forced to hand over about Tk 300 crore worth of extra mangoes to wholesalers.

Citing these irregularities, 10 mango farmers from Chapainawabganj have applied to have the buying of mangoes at 52–54 kg a maund stopped.

They submitted a written application to the agriculture minister after a meeting at the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council in the capital at noon on Thursday, 10 August.

The application said that although the government and the minister's ministry have given them various kinds of support, they are not getting the correct weight when they sell mangoes. Wholesalers force them to sell at 52–54 kg to the maund, so that Chapainawabganj farmers alone have to give away about Tk 500 crore worth of mangoes free every year, causing them losses.

The application also said the farmers had tried to stop the taking of extra mangoes, but the problem could not be solved because the wholesalers form a powerful syndicate.

Ahsan Habib, member secretary of the Chapainawabganj Mango Foundation, said: "All our lives we have heard that 40 kg makes one maund. But as mango is perishable, mangoes used to be sold at Kansat at 45 kg to the maund. For the past two years, however, wholesalers have started buying at 52–54 kg. We are suffering losses, so we have applied to the agriculture minister."

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.