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Monday | 13 January 2025 | Epaper

Growers upset over rotten potato seeds in Meherpur

Published : Sunday, 30 October, 2016 at 12:00 AM  Count : 470
MR Alam
MEHERPUR, Oct 29: Potato farmers here at Gopalnagar village in the outskirt of the district town, have become very much frustrated as their seeds preserved at a local cold storage either got rotten or sprouted due to the laxity of the cold-storage authorities.
As a result, the scarcity of quality seeds has put them in great agony at the onset of potato sowing season. They are going to incur losses as they have to buy seeds at high prices.
The farmers preserve potato seeds in Ridny cold storage at the village every year. But this year most of the seeds have already sprouted at the cold storage before sowing at fields which are not considered as good in quality for planting, sources opined.
But the cold-storage authority claimed that there is no problem in planting the same though it sprouted.
The farmers preserved the seeds in the storage for in the months of March and April until November 15 by paying Tk 330 per bag. There are 56 thousand bags potatoes in Ridny Cold Store.
Out of them, some 20 thousand bags are earmarked for seeds and rest 36 thousand bags for using as vegetable. The present market price of those potatoes is more than Tk 10 million.
They will take the delivery of their potatoes from the cold storage from November 1 but most of the seeds have been sprouted there. If those are preserved 15 days more, it will not be possible to plant them, farmers said.
If they plant those seeds now, they will not get yield as per their expectation.
It is not possible to run a cold store without a generator during power outage. The cold store has been running without generator for the last ten years' sources said.  
Barikul Islam Lizon of village Ashrafpur under Sadar upazila of the district said that the potato each of growers kept 50 to 1000 bags of potatoes at the storage on an average which have already been sprouted. If they sell it out in markets, they will not get proper prices.
Dablu, a potato grower of Fouzdari Para said, "I persevered four thousand sacks of potato seeds in the storage and requested the storage authority time and again to arrange a generator, but they did not pay heed.
In the last month, locals experienced unbearable load-shedding. Only 7 to 8 hours electricity was available in 24 hours. Almost all my preserved potatoes sprouted.
When contacted, owner of Ridny Cold Store Topon denied the allegation of their carelessness and said they ensured 24-hour power supply to the cold storage.
They do not need any generation for power-back as the electricity connection of the storage was taken from VIP line, he added.
If there is a power-cut due to technical failure, they have nothing to do, and this kind of situation is very unusual here.
He claimed that sprouted seeds will provide good yield as usual.
District Seeds Certifying Officer Dr Akhtaruzzaman said that potato seeds have to be preserved in fixed temperature, otherwise there is every possibility of the seeds to be damaged.
He suggested that the seeds which have already sprouted are to be kept in a low-temperature.
In higher temperature, all the nutrients contained in the seeds would be reduced.  As a result, the seeds will get weaken and farmers will not get good yield as per their expectation, he added.






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