More than 500 hectares of land from the total 1500 hectares used to grow Kuphri and Pokhraj types of potato by farmers in Jalpaiguri District have been destroyed by bacteria.

Informing about the issue, District Agriculture Department officials informed that the farmers had brought the potato seeds from another state. Raiganj, Dhoopguri, Mainaguri, Jalpaiguri Sadar and Mal in Jalpaiguri District along with Kumargram and Alipurduwar Block in Alipurduwar District are the places where the potato plants have been affected by the bacteria.

A team of pest control specialist from the department visited the places and took stock of the situation. The team also educated the farmers on the ways to control the bacteria and also made aware about other diseases prone to potato plants.

Notably, the farmers had planted the Kuphri and Pokhraj variety of potato seeds before Durga puja and were to be harvested before the advent of the winter season. However, more than 500 hectares of land of the total 1,500 hectares have been destroyed by the bacteria already, raising concerns among the farmers.

According to the farmers, the potatoes are harvested after 70 days of plantation, but the plants this year died off within 30-35 days. Meanwhile, the potatoes harvested are getting bad due to the bacteria within 24 hours, while the ones saved have lower weight than usual. Almost the entire production of the Kuphri and Pokhraj potatoes planted across the district has been destroyed in the same way.

District Agriculture Department’s crop protection head Tapan Sarkar said experts from Pundibari Agriculture University in Coochbehar and departmental officials visited the various affected places in Jalpaiguri District and investigated the issue. “It was found out that the particular species of potato was being affected by bacteria due to which the plant was dying off early and the harvested potatoes were going bad within a day,” he added. There was no other information provided by the department about the compensation for the losses incurred by the farmers.

Source - http://echoofindia.com/