Despite growing apricots and apples, farmers in Shyok Valley in northern Ladakh are unable to turn a profit because lack of connectivity makes it difficult to sell their produce
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Shyok Valley
in northern Ladakh, ahead of the well-known cold desert Hunder in the Nubra
Valley, has a reliable source of water from Shyok River after which it is
named. The water and the relatively mild weather for eight months of the year
allow farmers to raise two crops.
Yet for
Ghulam Mehdi, a 31-year-old farmer, it’s tough to make ends meet. He is the
youngest of five brothers, and together they own just under 2 acres of land (15
kanal in local terms) in Garadi, a village in Leh district and close to the town
of Turtuk in Baltistan.
They have a fishpond,
dug under a government scheme to promote pisciculture, where they have mountain
trout and other fish. Mussa Mehdi, the
oldest of the brothers, dug the pond manually since there were no machines. The
few cattle and poultry fulfill the needs of the family. They run a wayside
eatery and a home stay.
As for their
income, Ghulam said, “What comes in goes out as fast since we are a 28-member
household.” Assets, for this family at
least, remains a distant dream, given its size, and succession, which Ghulam
hinted at – the 15 kanal of land will be divided among the five brothers, each
of whom has several children.
With the
river flowing noisily below their farm, the fields of buckwheat were a lush
green. The crops they grow are buckwheat, barley and millets; but the poplar
and willow trees grown here are the ones that provide income. Yet without
connectivity beyond the valley, farmers struggle to sell their produce.
Need for
connectivity
“We need
better infrastructure, roads that will take our produce from here,” Mussa
Mehdi, oldest of the brothers told VillageSquare.in. “If the
airport at Thois is opened up, we would get more tourists.” Thois is an Indian
Air Force (IAF) base, close to Garadi but used only for military flights.
Living in
far-flung, areas cut-off from the rest of the country, people here understand
the benefits of tourism for the local economy. They know what tourism has done
to the economies of Leh and other parts of Ladakh.
But this is
an area close to the Line of Control adjacent to Gilgit-Baltistan in
Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. Though the military air base cannot be used for
tourism, the villagers feel it can be used to transport their agricultural
produce from this remote and mountainous region.
Value
addition
A few years
ago, the juice of sea buckthorn that grows wild in this region, was a big hit,
following awareness about its health benefits. But later it went out of fashion
because of the amount of sugar added to it. The fruit is sour and slightly
bitter, eaten straight off the wild tree.
In early
September, the apple and apricot season was ending even as the last of the
fruits were still ripening on the trees. Ghulam said that value additions do
fetch a better price. “We dry the apricots which earn a better price. Selling
the apricots with badam inside each fruit, fetches an even better price,” he
said.
The Mehdis
produce about 15 quintals of fruits but getting it to market where they will
earn significantly is a question that keeps coming up.
The region,
with its eight-month farming season, is better off than the other parts of the
union territory, said Ghulam. “Winter ends by February so we start planting by
March. We have a mild climate from then till October so we can grow two crops
unlike in other parts of Ladakh,” he told VillageSquare.in.
Need for
marketing support
In early
September, the Mehdi’s farm in Garadi in the narrow valley in the shadow of
Karakoram mountains had apple and apricot trees laden with the last of the
fruits. The brothers said that support from the government, especially in
marketing, would be of help to them.
“We grow
apples, apricots and some grapes,” said Mussa. “If we store the apples which
are now available and sell them in January and February, we would get a better
price. We do store them but transportation from here to the markets is very
expensive.”
Access to
marketing, always a sore point with growers, is the crux of the problem. And
farmers in Shyok Valley are no different from those in other, better-connected,
parts of the country, who also point out that they can grow the produce, but
marketing is not their expertise.
Be it
vegetable, fruits or grains like millet, buckwheat and barley, everyone
practices organic farming. “All our produce is organic and it would be good if
some agency would transport our goods to the market. It is very expensive for
us to take it out of our region,” said Ghulam.
As the fresh
apricot season ends and the value-added dried apricots start coming into the
market by end of September, the farmers are keener than ever that their produce
reaches markets where there would be a better price realization.
Gouri
Agtey Athale is a Pune-based journalist. Views are personal.
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