Albert Fernandes | NT
CANACONA
Mango plantations are next only to cashew in Canacona. But, the farmers in the taluka, barring a few of them, are still not aware of the right method for mango plantation so that they can exploit it commercially.
The farmers here in a way have failed to get the method right for mango plantation so as to get high yield.
When contacted, Canacona zonal agriculture officer (ZAO) Shivram Gaonkar said that most of the farmers here appeared not very serious about commercially exploiting the mango crop.
“They grow mango grafts along with other crops without looking at the suitability of the crop for better yield. Most of the farmers do not reserve areas for the mango plantation, hence the yield is very low,” he said.
“When grown among other plants, which grow tall such as coconut trees, the mango grafts go on competing with these trees, and hence the mango plants keep growing and bear no flowers and in turn no fruits,” he said.
“Mango plants need special plots for better branching, flowering and fruiting, and this aspect is not taken seriously by most of the farmers in the taluka,” he said.
The ZAO felt that the farmers in Canacona are not too focused on commercialisation of mango crop such as the farmers in Salcete, Tiswadi and Bardez, and hence they grow this crop among other crops, resulting in low yield or sometimes no yield at all even after 7-8 years of plantation.
He said that in order to get productive flowering stage followed by fruiting, the mango crop should be subjected to water stress which is most important.
“If this is done, the trees will bloom with flowers, resulting in a good yield. Mango crop is affected often due to climatic changes from time to time,” he added.
According to Gaonkar, farmers should plant 100 mango grafts per hectare with pits at a distance of 10 metres.
He also said that if a farmer grows with a higher density, 150 grafts can be accommodated in a hectare of land.
He further said that when the crop is individualised for better yield with enough spacing, the left out space or the space in between can be utilised for growing turmeric, ginger, onions or some other tuber crops, but before the mango flowering takes place or during the monsoon.
As far as the varieties are concerned, farmers prefer mancurad, musrad, Xavier, Alphonso, mangilal, he said adding these varieties were introduced in Goa by the Portuguese.
Regional varieties like ratna, Sindhu and some other regular varieties like kesar, langda etc are also planted by the farmers.
However, appreciating the farmers in Canacona,
Gaonkar said that they do not use artificial manure for the crop. Mostly they use organic manure to raise these plants, so the mangoes yielded have high nutritional value, he said adding the mangoes marketed in other areas mostly are raised using by artificial manure and even ripened artificially.
Gaonkar pointed out that most prominent mango farmers in the taluka are Madhav Acharya of Loliem, Kush Gaonkar of Delem and Vikas Desai.
A visit to Madhav Acharya’s farm in Loliem, revealed that all mango trees were grown systematically in rows maintaining a proper distance.
Speaking to this reporter, Acharya informed that he has around 900 mango trees of different varieties raised on a plot admeasuring 8 acres.
When asked if he is happy about his plantation, he said, “Why not! You can see the crop for yourself. When you put in efforts, the crops don’t fail you. Rather you get a good yield. However the climatic changes do affect, which is but natural.”
“Wild animals venture into my plantation and take away mangoes that fall down or at times even remove the fruits from the trees, which are branched on all the sides,” he said.
Moreover, he suggested that the forest department should grow some fruit-bearing trees for the wild animals so that they do not come to villages.
As regards, subsidy, as of now, the farmers can avail only state sector support, informed the ZAO, which is Rs 30,000 per hectare area for mango
plantation.