Early potato planting has begun in Dinajpur, but higher prices for seed potatoes, fertiliser, pesticide and labour have doubled production costs. Even so, with the weather favourable, farmers are busy harvesting short-duration early Aman rice and then ploughing, tending and fertilising the same land, collecting seed from cold stores and planting potatoes.

The Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) says early potato varieties will be grown on about 11,000 hectares in the district this year. But farmers are struggling over seed and fertiliser, which they have to buy at well above government prices.

The government seed potatoes being supplied this year have been priced at Tk 57 to Tk 66 a kg depending on the variety, but government seed is scarce compared with demand. According to sources, BADC produces 20 to 25 percent of seed potatoes; the rest are kept by farmers at home or produced by various NGOs and private organisations. With government seed in short supply, farmers are forced to buy at higher prices. Seed they could buy for Tk 50 to Tk 60 last year now costs Tk 80 to Tk 85.

Dealers buy triple superphosphate (TSP) at the government price of Tk 1,250 but sell it for Tk 1,350. Diammonium phosphate (DAP), with a government price of Tk 950, sells for Tk 1,050. Muriate of potash (MOP), government price Tk 900, sells for Tk 1,000. Urea, with a government price of Tk 1,250, will be sold to farmers at Tk 1,350.

But farmers are having to pay Tk 1,700 for Tunisian TSP and Tk 2,200 for local TSP, Tk 1,100 for Moroccan DAP and Tk 1,500 for local DAP, Tk 1,200 for Canadian MOP, and the government price for Russian MOP. Several farmers said no dealer gives a receipt, and dealers refuse to sell fertiliser if a receipt is asked for. Farmers said, however, that urea is being sold at the right price.

Farmers also use cow dung, mixed fertiliser, gypsum, zinc, magnesium and boron on potato land. This month Dinajpur district has been allocated 2,689 tonnes of TSP, 4,496 tonnes of DAP and 3,275 tonnes of MOP for potato cultivation.

Across several upazilas, farmers were seen preparing land with various fertilisers and planting seed potatoes in lines. An acre needs 25 to 28 maunds of seed potatoes and yields 140 to 150 maunds, and the crop is harvested within 50 to 55 days of planting. Although Agrahayan is the potato season, farmers are planting early potatoes in Ashwin in the hope of higher prices.

Farmers Juyel Islam, Mokchhed Ali, Abdur Razzak and Abu Sayem of Ghughudanga village in Sadar upazila said they are paying double for ploughing, fertiliser, seed, labour and pesticide this year, raising their costs. Growing an acre of potatoes will cost Tk 1,20,000, and unless potato prices are high they will face losses from early planting.

"Dealers are selling fertiliser at twice the government price, and if we ask for a receipt they say there is no fertiliser and send us back," they said. "So we are forced to buy at double the set price without a receipt."

"Farmers are busy growing crops in the field," said Juyel Islam. "Farmers have no organisation and no way to press demands. We never see the agriculture officers, the SAAOs who are supposed to be in the field, yet pesticide company people are going around the fields to farmers. So farmers are always cheated. If farmers can sell early potatoes for at least Tk 50 to Tk 60, they may make some profit."

Potato grower Maulana Emdadul Haque said he has planted potatoes on several bighas, growing early potatoes in the hope of better prices. New potatoes fetch more than Tk 100 every year, he said. He sends his potatoes to local markets and the capital, and hopes for good prices again.

Anwar Hossain of Robipur village in Birol upazila said there is a kind of race to plant early potatoes: the earlier a farmer's potatoes come up, the better the price. Demand for new potatoes is huge at the start of the season, and a farmer who reaches consumers early can double his profit.

"Growing early potato varieties and selling them at high prices in the capital and divisional cities is profitable," said Aminul Islam of Goaldihi village in Khansama upazila. "Early potatoes do a lot to make up for losses on other crops, so I grow them."

Several dealers contacted declined to comment. But a former leader of the BADC seed and fertiliser dealers' association, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "We have to make a pay order against the allocated seed potatoes and fertiliser. Then, when we go to lift the fertiliser from the warehouse, we have to pay a set extra amount per sack as a bribe or 'salami' on the officer's instructions."

Answering another question, he said: "I don't want to name names. There is a syndicate, which is why seed potatoes and fertiliser sell at higher prices. No one can do anything alone even if they want to. A complaint was made to the chairman too, but nothing came of it. Seed potato allocations have fallen. Allocations are decided in Dhaka, and the game is played from there."

Another dealer said dealers blame senior officials sitting in air-conditioned rooms in Dhaka for the rise in BADC seed potato prices, citing unplanned shifting of seed potatoes. Despite heavy demand in the Dinajpur region, seed potatoes grown there are shifted to other cold stores. Most of the seed allocated to Dinajpur-region dealers this year has to be collected from BADC cold stores in Kashimpur, Madhupur, Kurigram and Rangpur, raising transport and other costs. Had the allocation been made from BADC's Dinajpur, Thakurgaon and Panchagarh cold stores, those costs would have been lower.

They added that seed potatoes kept in the Dinajpur-region cold stores have been allocated to other districts, and a new, harassing rule has been imposed on dealers from Dhaka. Because of it, dealers had to deposit money for Asterix seed potatoes about one and a half months in advance, paying extra bank interest. To make up for it, dealers are more or less forced to sell seed potatoes at higher prices. Under the same rule, seed potatoes are also being steered after a set time to the shops of certain dealers in the region, who sell them to farmers at inflated prices.

Asked about fertiliser allocation and overpricing, joint director (fertiliser) Md Shawkat Ali said: "Fertiliser supply is normal. The claim of selling at higher prices is not true. No extra money is taken from dealers to lift allocated fertiliser from my warehouse. If such complaints are received, necessary action will be taken."

Calls to the mobile phone of deputy director (seed marketing) Abdur Rashid over two days about seed potatoes found it switched off.

Md Nuruzzaman, deputy director of the DAE in Dinajpur, said the district's potato target has not yet been finalised. According to the draft list, potatoes will be grown on 47,236 hectares in Dinajpur, of which early varieties will cover 11,000 hectares. Early seed potatoes have been planted on about 7,000 hectares so far, and planting will be finished in a few days.

He said he had received no reports or complaints of fertiliser and seed selling at higher prices, but if fertiliser is being overpriced he will look into it and take action against dealers. "A cash memo must be given when fertiliser is sold. If it is not given, that is wrong."

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