Cheaper Sri Lankan imports drag domestic pepper prices

Pepper farmers are keeping their fingers crossed over the fall in prices by around ₹19 per kg in the last fortnight. The decline in the last week itself was ₹11, they said, adding that the total drop in the last five weeks works out to around ₹34 per kg.

The farming community attributed the reasons for the fall in prices to huge arrivals of imported produce from Sri Lanka under SAFTA at 8 per cent duty. Prices are ruling at ₹627 for ungarbled and ₹647 for garbled in the Kochi terminal market.

Kishore Shamji, a pepper trader in Kochi, said almost all the consuming markets are flushed with availability of Sri Lankan pepper reported to have arrived from Mumbai and selling even in southern markets as well.

The emerging situation has added further pressure on indigenously grown pepper, leading to a drop and forcing farmers in all the growing states in the South to liquidate their stock.

Even the farmers’ societies who had covered pepper anticipating recovery were also seen trying to liquidate their stocks, he said.

Lanka’s share in imports

Quoting figures, he said the total imports from Sri Lanka during July, August and September stood at 10,433 tonnes out of the total 12,606 tonnes from other producing countries.

Shamji who is also the director of Indian Pepper and Spices Trade Association said that Sri Lankan production has increased above 25,000 tonnes and they are looking at India to sell off their surplus stock where there is a huge demand in the domestic market.

But the imported stuff is reportedly of lower bulk density, higher percentage of moisture and also having the presence of fungus, he alleged and added that this was also a contributing factor for the domestic prices to fall.

The Kerala chapter of Indian Pepper and Spice Traders Growers Consortium has urged the government to curb such imports, as it is hitting the domestic farmers’ interest badly.

The consortium alleged that the loopholes in the import policy are enabling the imported pepper, which is meant for re-exports, to enter into the domestic market.

The DGFT has granted a six months period to hold imported pepper prior to re-export is one of the major anomalies in the import-export policy for a sensitive item like pepper, he added.