A large mango market has grown up in the district's border upazila of Sapahar, and it is getting busier by the day. Traders come from districts across the country to buy mangoes, and about Tk 25 crore worth changes hands at the market every day. But growers are angry that, with production costs high, they are not getting fair prices.

Every day from first light, orchard owners arrive on vans, bhotbhotis and auto-rickshaws to sell mangoes from villages in Sapahar and neighbouring Porsha and Patnitala upazilas. With no fixed site for the market, the seasonal fruit is bought and sold on the Sapahar-Patnitala road.

Mango arats line both sides of the road, where traders come from Dhaka, Jashore, Satkhira, Khulna and other districts to buy. The market runs for three months, from May to July.

The district's mangoes are widely known because those grown in the clay soil of the Barind are very tasty and sweet. Amrapali, BARI-4, Fazli and Banana Mango are now on the market. Amrapali is selling at Tk 2,200 to Tk 3,200 a maund depending on quality, BARI-4 at Tk 2,700 to Tk 3,100, Fazli at Tk 1,800 to Tk 2,000 and Banana Mango at Tk 6,000.

Amrapali tops consumers' list. Of the 30,000 hectares of mango orchards of various varieties in the district, 18,313.5 hectares are Amrapali. Its sweet aroma makes consumers keener still, and Amrapali could become the district's brand in future.

Orchard owners say that this year drought, labour wages and higher prices of fuel, fertiliser and pesticide have raised the cost of growing mangoes by about Tk 4,000 to Tk 5,000 a bigha. On top of that, a syndicate of aratdars forces them to sell at 52 kg to the maund instead of 48 kg. They would profit if the price were Tk 4,000 a maund, they say.

Rafiqul Islam, a grower from Uligram in the upazila, said costs are higher this year and labour is scarce for picking mangoes and bringing them to market; it is hard to find workers even at Tk 500 a day. "The maund was supposed to be 48 kg, but because of the traders' syndicate we are forced to sell at 52 kg. The price is also low. We are not getting a price that covers our costs," he said.

Ibrahim Hossain of Kansat village in Chapainawabganj district, who packs mangoes into crates at an arat, said crate packers can earn Tk 500 to Tk 1,000 a day. Each arat employs 5 to 15 workers packing crates, and about 5,000 seasonal workers have found jobs in the upazila, he said.

Bakul Hossain, an aratdar from Jatrabari in Dhaka, said Sapahar's Amrapali is very tasty and sweet and in great demand. The top price is now Tk 3,300 a maund. He buys about 150 crates (75 maunds) a day here to supply Dhaka and several other districts.

A trader named Abdur Rashid said several seasonal traders sell crates (plastic baskets) in the upazila during mango season. Weaker crates sell for Tk 70 each and good ones for Tk 240, and crates worth about Tk 30 crore will be sold at the market this season.

Md Rezaul Karim, vice-president of the Sapahar Aratdar Samity, said there are about 350 mango arats large and small in the upazila. As the days pass, the volume of mangoes is falling and prices are rising. About Tk 25 crore worth of mangoes are traded at the market every day and supplied to Dhaka and other districts.

He said growers' complaint about a 52 kg maund is not true: "We buy at 48 kg to the maund, as the administration's rule says." But growers bring all their mangoes mixed together without sorting, so traders agree with them to take a few extra kilograms, he said.

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