West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is always keen to take decisions. On the flipside, in a hurry to prove her keenness, she often takes a wrong call.

The case in point is the recent potato crisis. Last week the Banerjee Government decided to cap the retail price of the common Jyoti variety at Rs 13 a kg. Apparently, this was a measure to safeguard consumers’ interest in the face of spiralling potato prices over the last one month.

But the initiative was counter productive. As on Tuesday, the auspicious day of Bhai-Phonta (when sisters pray for the longevity of their brothers) potatoes were scarce in the retail market. And, whatever was available was exorbitantly priced. In her haste to keep consumers happy, Bannerjee simply overlooked the bigger issue.

Many issues

To start with, potato farmers had incurred heavy losses throughout this year as the tuber was selling at much less than the production and storage cost of Rs 5-5.30 a kg at the wholesale market.

Prices started rising beginning September-end due to festive season demand. But the real trigger came in October when a quintal became nearly Rs 100 costlier in the wholesale market.

This was due to untimely rains that postponed the sowing season by nearly three weeks.

Since the stored stock was sufficient to meet demand till December when the early tuber varieties start arriving, the markets anticipated a clear shortage.

Banerjee made the situation more complex by imposing a ban on export of potato from West Bengal to neighbouring states.

This has not gone down well with the traders who had already booked their cargo.

Nearly 40 per cent of the State’s production is used in meeting demand of the entire East and North-East.

The irony is, if this trade is stopped, then prices in State will touch bottom and farmers will simply lose interest in potato farming, resulting in price rise the next year.

The State Government simply didn’t take that into consideration. True, the trade is cornering a greater share of the final price paid by the consumer.

But, that calls for restructuring the marketing principles by allowing big retailers to procure directly from the farmer.

And, it was Mamata Bannerjee only who is against such reforms in agricultural marketing.

A proposal to amend the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee Act (APMC) was struck down by her government.

Worse, despite rising interest by farmers to engage in contract farming for the food processing sector, her government doesn’t accept that as a reality.

>pratim.bose@thehindu.co.in

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