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RAJSHAHI, Nov 04: Farmers of Tanore, Durgapur, Puthia and Paba upazilas in the district who stored potato in cold storages are facing crisis due to excessive rent.
It is alleged, the farmers have turned hostages to the cold storages owners.
As a result, most of the potato growers are incurring loss instead of profit by storing potato in the cold storages.
According to sources, considering the interest of the labourers, the higher court directed to store potato in a 50-kg a sack.
Accordingly, owners of the cold storages for the first time started to store a 50-kg sack potato for the first time this year.
Farmers alleged that while taking delivery of potato from the storage, they found each sack weighing two to three kgs less.
It is learnt, during previous years, potato was stored in 85 to 90 kilogramme sack at a rent of Tk 365 per sack. This year the rent for storing per sack of potato (a 50-kg sack) has been fixed at Tk 265. The farmers mentioned that this was higher compared to 85 kg to 90 kg sack rate.
Moreover, stored potatoes sometimes become rotten which the owners of cold storages never compensate. Rather they force the farmers to sign a document before storing potato that the farmers would not be able to claim any compensation from cold storage owners if the stored potato was found rotten or damaged due to trouble in cold storage machinery or for erratic electricity supply.
It is alleged, the farmers who produce potato through their hard labour are regularly being cheated by the seasonal potato traders or middlemen syndicate.
A good number of cultivators said the system of selling cold storage space through "booking receipt" well ahead of harvesting of potato to the middlemen is in practice year after year but no action was ever taken against these operators.
It is further learnt, the owners of cold storages disburse loan to the potato farmers at a high interest rate, usually at 18 per cent to 22 per cent interest. According to government policy, no interest over 9.0 per cent can be realised from any client.
Potato farmers informed it costs Tk 30,000 to Tk 35,000 to plough, transplant and harvest potato in a bigha of land. But due to excessive storage cost and for not getting proper price, many of the potato farmers of the district were turning paupers.
The rate of potato storage has been fixed in accordance to a decision of the association, said Fazlur Rahman, managing director of Rahman Cold Storage and General Secretary of Rajshahi district Cold Storages Association.
Chowdhury Golam Rabbi, upazila nirbahi officer of Tanore upazila, said action will be taken against the cold storages if farmers submit a written complaint in this connection.