Kerala Cooperative Department’s plan to procure paddy to rice has come to a halt

Kerala Cooperative Department’s plan to procure paddy from farmers and trade it has come to a halt now. Earlier, it was announced that rice grown on Kerala’s soil would be brought to the market to give fierce competition to private brands. Not only this, but there was also a plan to set up a government rice mill that has also stalled.

The Kerala Paddy Procurement Processing and Marketing Cooperative Society was set up to procure paddy from farmers at a fair price and trade it by converting it into rice. These societies become a key agent that transfers paddy to private mills. There are two mills owned by the government in Palakkad and Kottayam Vechur, but they are not able to process one-fourth of the entire paddy. At present, the government does not have a mill to convert the paddy into rice. Moreover, two modern mills were announced in 1999, but the construction of one of the mills at Thakazhi in the Alappuzha district has also come to a halt halfway. The operations of the Alathur Modern Rice Mill, having the largest dryer system in Asia, are also stalled.

Addressing this issue, the Kerala Cooperative Department had devised a comprehensive plan to establish government-owned rice mills in the districts of Palakkad and Kottayam. Interestingly, it was also stated that the mill of Kottayam could store and process the paddy of central Kerala into rice. Apart from this, lack of experience and systems to store and process the rice are the major reasons why the Cooperative Department’s project is facing delay. The farmers are not being paid regularly for the paddy stored by the supply company. This is somewhat burdening them. Amid all this, it was expected that the storage of paddy by the Cooperative Department would provide a sigh of relief to the farmers.