Farmers say No

...to organic fertiliser, claiming hybrid seeds only respond to chemical conditioners:

by Rukshana Rizwie

Pic: Sundayobserver.lk

During the past week the government has relentlessly advocated the use of organic fertiliser saying this was the rationale to provide farmers with cash instead of fertiliser at a subsided price.

"What are we to use the organic fertiliser on?" queried Nandasena, a farmer from Welimada. "None of the hybrid seeds we use grow with organic fertiliser. The government might as well buy the farm," he said.

The government might have gone against the political grain, by not agreeing to the fertiliser subsidy, Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture B. Wijayaratne told the Sunday Observer. "Perhaps we had not been clear about our motives or bolstered our awareness campaigns to educate farmers before the announcements were made."

Disparity

Namal Karunaratne, national organiser of the All Ceylon Peasants Federation said "Every attempt by the government to sow seeds of change will be met with disdain. There is an obvious disparity between the government's efforts to encourage the use of organic fertiliser and the national policy," he said. "Nowhere in the national policy does it say that Sri Lanka would shift to being organic, in fact if statistics are to be discerned, we will be importing more chemical fertiliser year-on-year till 2018," he said.

The lack of a far-sighted plan in the use of chemical fertiliser and the paradigm shift to going organic is glaringly reflected in the country's National Agricultural Policy.

Among the seven goals and objectives that have been listed in the policy, none of it pertains to the use of organic fertiliser except 'environment-friendly techniques be used in agriculture.'

"Only the government would know what they are," added Karunaratne. "We as farmers certainly don't have a clue,"he said.

Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture Wijayaratne said on the directive of President Maithripala Sirisena, the Minister of Agriculture Duminda Dissanayake held a meeting with peasants and farmer cooperatives in Polonnaruwa last week.

"We advised them on how they could use cash to buy more organic fertiliser and save money."

Wijayaratne hoped farmers would adopt and accept the change because the new measures were here to stay. During the discussions, academics were invited to present their findings on the use of organic and inorganic fertiliser practices for a healthy harvest.

He, however, admitted that shifting to organic fertiliser overnight was not practical. "We don't have all the organic fertiliser we need. We can't easily import it because organic fertiliser is not cheap," he said. "But we're trying to induce farmers that we need to shift and we need to do it quick," he said. SW Abeysekara, a retired director of the Rice Research and Development Institute said there was a lack of communication between the state and the farmers.

"Farmers are keen on hybrid seeds because of high yields," he said. "Hybrid seeds are best nurtured with chemical fertiliser due to the quick release of nitrogen. They would wilt with organic fertiliser," he said.

"Not all farmers necessarily know how to apply organic fertiliser and what to use or what to expect," he said. "Matters such as this need to be institutionalised."

"A paddy field of one hectare would need five tonnes of organic fertiliser. Farmers don't have that amount, and neither does the government. We need to get down to practical issues, " he said.

"Over 700 onion farmers in Dambulla suffered losses due to substandard seeds bought from a private company in the area.

According to the existing law, farmers who are affected cannot claim compensation. They had to bear the loss of Rs 25million," Dilani Hirimuthugodage, a research officer at the Institute of Policy Studies stressed.

Seed Act

She referred to the seed protection system and the proposed new Seed Act. Last year moves were under way to table a new Seed Act which would take into consideration the changes that had taken place in the local agriculture sector in recent years.

This includes the use of fertiliser and its various applications.

"The proposed Bill is yet to see the light of day," a source at the Ministry of Agriculture said.

Meanwhile, the Food and Agriculture Organization said it had received a request from the government for technical information on the use of chemical fertiliser.

Dr. D.B.T Wijeratne, the Assistant Representative for the FAO in Sri Lanka told the Sunday Observer that the Organisation had just received an initiation for a technical study on the use of chemical fertiliser. "We're still in the initial stages of the discussion," he said.

Wijeratne added the government may need to revise its policies and recommendations before reaching out to farmers. "If it makes no sense to them and if they are ill-prepared to deal with the issue, then we too can't manage it," he said.