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Overcoming coconut industry crisis

I refer to the letter that appeared in the Daily News of January 16 written by Nalin Jayasinghe, the President of the Coconut Products Traders’ Association commenting on the article written by me with the above caption that appeared in the Daily News of January 1.

I do not expect the President of the Coconut Products Traders’ Association to agree with the above article, written by me as a representative of the coconut growers and I respect his right to express his views.

Nonetheless, there are some misrepresentations made by him and I wish to comment on those:

1. The writer states that “if the said measures (e.g. allow importation of 30,000 Tons of Copra and duty free import of coconut oil) were not taken the retail prices of coconuts would have touched Rs. 50 per nut or more during the November and December period”.

My information is no Copra was imported (up to December 31) due to high prices, poor quality and other logistical problems and even with duty free imports an insignificant quantity of coconut oil has been imported as is much expensive and coconut oil was marketed in Colombo at around Rs. 220,000 per ton. Yet the retail price of coconuts according to published information remained below Rs. 35.

2. The writer states that I have deliberated “that the shortage was not due to land fragmentation over the years”. What I have stated in the article is as given below: “Those who do not have an indepth understanding of the industry, assume the haphazard fragmentation of lands is the cause whenever coconut production goes down and that legislation will overcome it. The discussion of this subject is outside the scope of this article.

      Average coconut production:
1980 to 1989 - 			2,377 million nuts
1990 to 1999 - 			2,508 million nuts  
2000 to 2006 - 			2,683 million nuts
2006 (Jan. to November) - 	2,562 million nuts
2007 (Jan. to November) - 	2,672 million nuts  

The major causes that prevents further increase in production are the dwindling fertility of land, the age of the stands, the density of productive trees in lands, and neglect of cultural practices for moisture conservation to counter decrease in rainfall.”

I leave it to the readers to judge what I meant. What do the figures extracted from ‘The Sri lanka Coconut Statistics’ published by the Coconut Development Authority (CDA) mean, when these show a rising production trend, where is the effect of land fragmentation. (See table)

3. I have not written anywhere in the article (as the writer says) that the growers are “not happy with the present prices”.

After demonstrating that the price of inputs particularly fertiliser and diesoline has gone up at a faster rate than the rate of rise of coconuts, (At the time when the article was written in mid December, the farm gate price was Rs 20) I stated that “This does not mean that that the growers are asking for more. Nonetheless, the present high prices of nuts help to cushion the effect of low crops experienced by the growers.”

The low crops that I am referring to, are the ones that the growers and other agencies were experiencing in November/December.

The present good prices have come at a most opportune time, when even those who have continuously fertilised their lands were discouraged from doing so with the price of fertiliser nearly doubling to Rs. 45,000 per ton. If that happens, the country would not even get the current annual production rather than to reach the illusive figure of 3.6 billion nuts.

4. As for his statement that, “please hand over that land to someone who can do better.” It is well known that the prime coconut lands that were taken over from the growers during land reform in 1973 and handed over to other agencies are today in a worst state and the Government authorities are engaged on a protracted legal battle to wrest control of nearly 10,000 acres of prime lands on grounds of mismanagement.

5. It was not my intention to challenge the CDA on the production figures, but to ask a rational question, that if the production in 2007 is predicted to be 2900 million, why is there such a scarcity and goes on to say that part of the problem is the unprecedented small size nuts, as the processing industry is aware with the low out-turns.

Well Mr. Jayasinghe’s letter gives a reason that according to the CDA, 40,000 tons of extra coconut oil has been produced in 2007, which is an acceptable explanation.

Nonetheless, I hope this figure is the aggregate total of extra oil actually produced in 2007, and is not determined by counting backwards on the reduction of edible oil imports, and assuming that the usual annual consumption requirement was replenished by local production.

The high price of edible oil has generated considerable consumer resistance, and economies in the usage of edible oil in the second half of the year and the demand for edible oil and usage has come down drastically.


Let’s unite in our celebration

Sri Lankans living in the Gulf are making elaborate arrangements to celebrate their country’s independence day, better known in the Gulf as national day. According to news reaching us, Sri Lankans belonging to various ethnic communities and different political parties have got together to celebrate this important occasion in every prominent city of the six GCC countries.

This is a unique occasion for us to display our patriotism to other nationals. While rejoicing this pleasant atmosphere, here in the Gulf, we learn with sadness that one of the grand old parties of Sri Lanka - United National Party (UNP) has decided to boycott the celebration organised by the Government.

If this really takes place, our country will become a laughing stock in the eyes of the world community. February 4 is a day celebrated by every Sri Lankan with no ethnic or political identity attached to it.

If this is the decision of the UNP leadership, I appeal to all rank and file of the party to defy this order and display your unity with the rest of the Sri Lankans, like your compatriots in the Gulf.

We believe that if the boycott goes ahead, it will be considered as a grave mistake on the part of the UNP leadership and they will never be forgiven by the patriotic citizens of our country. We pray that sanity will prevail in the end. We send our greetings to all Sri Lankans back home. Let’s unite in our celebration. Long live Sri Lanka!

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