Special varieties of chillies are selling at ₹13,600 per quintal, while the normal variety is priced at ₹11,500 a quintal. The average price of all chilli varieties was ₹20,500 per quintal in 2022-23, and the crop fetched farmers ₹20,000 per quintal in 2023-24.
Published Feb 20, 2025 | 3:28 PM ⚊ Updated Feb 20, 2025 | 3:28 PM
A sharp decline in exports has affected the chilli markets in Andhra Pradesh. The state has been exporting huge quantities of chillies to countries including China, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Thailand. Vyacheslav Argenberg/Wikimedia Commons)
Synopsis: Andhra Pradesh’s chill farmers are in trouble with the supply surpassing demand. Fuelled by a dip in exports and many importing countries growing chillies, the price of various varieties has plummeted. Even as the government is expecting more arrivals to the market, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has requested the Centre’s immediate support to the crisis. Meanwhile, the YSRCP blamed the government for the farmers’ predicament.
The plummeting price of chilli in Andhra Pradesh has set alarm bells ringing, besides triggering a political blame game.
The alarming situation has forced Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu to shoot letters to the Centre, seeking assistance for the farmers. He also raised the issue personally in Delhi, where he is attending the new chief minister Rekha Gupta’s swearing-in ceremony on Thursday, 20 February.
Special varieties of chillies were selling at ₹13,600 per quintal in Andhra Pradesh, while the normal variety was priced at ₹11,500 a quintal.
The state government was expecting a further crash in chill prices with the increasing arrival of the produce at the Guntur Mirchi Yard, the main chilli market yard in the state.
The average price of all chilli varieties was ₹20,500 per quintal in 2022-23, and the crop fetched farmers ₹20,000 per quintal in 2023-24.
Since Andhra Pradesh has a large number of farmers engaged in cultivating chilli, the price issue has become politically sensitive. According to the state government estimates, 1.8 lakh farmers were farming chilli in all districts, the highest being in Palnadu and Kurnool districts.
Export variety Guntur chillies that come in different colours and flavours are cultivated in Guntur’s Palnadu and Prakasam. (Visakha Budathadu/Wikimedia Commons)
In Palnadu, 54,216 were involved in chilli cultivation on 99,185 acres, followed by 51,573 farmers on Kurnool’s 95,478 acres. The average mirchi production per year has been pegged at a little over 5 lakh tonnes.
Prakasam, Krishna, and Anantapur districts, too, have significant chilli cultivation. Export variety Guntur chillies that come in different colours and flavours were being cultivated in Guntur’s Palnadu and Prakasam.
According to sources, a sharp decline in exports has affected the chilli markets in Andhra Pradesh. The state has been exporting huge quantities of chillies to countries including China, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Thailand.
With these countries, too, producing chillis, the supply has surpassed demand. Additionally, the farmers back home were hit by the unseasonal rains, officials said.
However, a dip in China’s chilli production might boost Andhra’s exports.
Chief Minister Naidu has urged the Centre to bear 100 per cent of the cost of market intervention after increasing the amount payable. Currently, rules mandate supporting only 25 per cent of the cost, which should be borne equally by the state and the Centre.
Naidu, in his letter, asked the Centre to increase the scope of market intervention to 75 per cent and wanted the Centre to bear the entire expenditure to help the farmers.
State Agriculture Minister K Atchannaidu said that the government withheld announcing the state-advised price for chilli since it was too low, and its fixation a little above the prevailing price would lead to the farmers incurring losses.
Instead, the minister said the government wanted the Centre to bear 100 per cent of the market intervention burden by enlarging its scope to 75 per cent of the crop.
Meanwhile, the YSRCP trained guns at the TDP-led NDA government in the state.
YSRCP supremo and former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy defied the model code of conduct in force for the MLC polls and visited the Guntur Mirchi Yard and met farmers on Wednesday, 19 February.
Following his visit, a case was registered against him for breaching the model code of conduct.
After visiting the yard, Jagan said farmers were unhappy under the Naidu dispensation. “Farmers are suffering because of the negligence of the NDA government,” he said, adding that the NDA coming to power in the state was like a curse befalling the people.
He said the former YSRCP government ensured a remunerative price for chilli. The open market price ranged between ₹21,000 and ₹27,000 per quintal, depending on the variety.
“We helped the farmers by supporting them financially. But the NDA government has betrayed the farmers,” he said and recalled that when he was the chief minister, traders used to be scared to sell spurious seeds, but now the government itself was encouraging such seeds.
He wondered whether Naidu was bothered about the problems of chilli farmers. “The farmers are not getting even ₹11,000 per quintal,” he said.
Minister Atchannaidu refuted the allegations. He said that if the price had crashed this year, it was on account of factors beyond the control of the state government.
He said that the average price of chilli during the past 10 years was only ₹13,600 per quintal. He said the price touched an all-time high of ₹20,000 only during the last two years due to international factors.
Atchannaidu castigated Jagan for making an issue to derive political mileage after allegedly destroying agriculture and allied fields when in power.
He said the NDA government has inherited legacy dues of ₹1,600 crore payable to farmers for purchasing paddy. “We paid the farmers after coming to power,” he said.
The minister also questioned the previous YSRCP government’s logic in fixing ₹7,000 as the state-advised price for chilli when the price in the open market was ₹12,000 in January 2020. It led to farmers suffering huge losses; he pointed out. The then-state government had not paid even a red cent to farmers under the market intervention scheme, he alleged.
(Edited by Majnu Babu).
