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Subsidy removal withers 500,000 coconut trees

by Ravi Ladduwahetty

A crisis currently looms over Sri Lanka's coconut industry with 500,000 trees withering due to the recent drought, following the termination of the subsidy given to growers for moisture retention from 1996 onwards during the PA regime, Plantation Industries Minister Lakshman Kiriella charged in an interview with the Daily News yesterday.

These trees would have easily withstood the drought if the subsidy had not been withdrawn. The subsidy, amounting to Rs. 15,000 per acre, was allocated for all nine coconut growing districts and ran into millions of rupees, growers told the Minister on a recent tour of Puttalam.

The Minister assured them that despite the current crisis, the Government will not permit the import of coconuts in order to protect the local growers but will permit the import of 40,000 tonnes of coconut oil so that the nut output could be used for consumption.

The Minister has directed the authorities to reinstate the subsidy in all nine coconut growing districts. As an emergency measure to revamp the industry, he has also allocated Rs. 25 million for drip irrigation in high productivity areas such as Kurunegala, Chilaw and Puttalam.

The Government also encouraged coconut cultivation in the Mahaweli areas under drip irrigation he said, and added that the current plantation of 1,500 acres under cultivation was a high output variety which yields in three years in contrast to the conventional one which takes between five and seven years.

He also said that the Government would be negotiating with the donor concerns for assistance for not only the coconut industry, but also for rubber. " All this time, it was the tea industry which received the attention of the lending agencies while rubber and coconut industries had been overlooked.

He said that an umbrella organisation would be formed for the coconut industry in the form of a Federation which will consolidate growers, manufacturers, desiccated coconut producers and millers so that it could present all issues collectively to the Government. He added that the donor concerns were also advocating the concept of the Federation for tea, rubber and coconut industries.

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