Chickpea challenging the top cash crops in catchment area

HYDERABAD: Picking green chickpeas is a good source of income for the women of forest-dwelling communities at a time, when urban and rural markets are flooded with the nutritious legume, which is considered an attractive foodstuff by consumers at large.

Chickpea, a winter crop, is valuable not only in terms of per acre income but also nutrition. It gives product at three stages. First the leaves are harvested for three-four times, then green seeds and at the end the mature product is picked.

Growers in the catchment area of the River Indus sow chickpeas in October and reap them in March. Their traditional practices help them grow organic crops in a way that keeps the cost of cultivation low, except for the expenditure on tractors for ploughing tracts of sowing grounds.

As the plants mature, women workers carefully sort out the valuable product and collect straw for animals. They are offered wages of around Rs10 per kg of the harvest. On average, each worker collects 10-15 kg daily, depending on how fast they work.

Right now, near the forest town Unarpur, Jamshoro district, the crop is in the middle stage and farmers have handed over their fields of green chickpeas to contractors/ traders for Rs85,000-90,000 per acre. Traders hire peasant women as workforce for picking green chickpeas. The fresh green seeds are eaten as vegetable.

They can be consumed raw, fried, roasted, and boiled. Leaving this part to traders makes things easier, hassle-free, and above all more profitable for farmers as they do not have to endure any expenses for picking, packing, transportation, and sale.

Traders bear the entire cost. That’s why farmers usually contract their fields to traders during the season. Farmers’ families also work as labourers and earn a little bit more. The chickpea straw itself has value as it is used as fodder. Street vendors can be seen around the cities, towns, as well as villages, selling fresh green seeds of chickpeas at Rs100-150 per kg. People take it as a seasonal product and fondly buy it for their families.

Chickpea harvest season usually starts in March and it has a per acre yield of around 25-30 maunds (1 maund is equal to 40kgs). Its value in market ranges from Rs3500-Rs4000. It is the most drought tolerant crop and farmers in the entire catchment area of River Indus produce it largely. In the winter a wide area is covered by chickpea crop in the riverine fields.

Despite increasing the local production of this highly potential crop by giving incentives to farmers the government imports this product at a great expense. Apart from this there is no exact data about the catchment area crops. Researchers believe the government has prioritised only some major crops. They set targets for the sowing area and announce their support prices prior to the arrival of the product in the market.

The cultivation of pulses (legumes) as well as oil seeds does not qualify as priority for the government. Thus it neither sets a cultivation target nor announces support/fixed prices for these crops for the benefit of the producers.

This gap needs to be filled through improved policy mechanism and announcement of integrated package for farmers to promote the cultivation of chickpeas and other pulse crops. The approach may bring change and promote organic crops and help ease the import bill of these procuts.

Mustafa Nangraj, a researcher and trainer with Sindh Agriculture Extension Department, said some 20-25 years back Sindh had around 2,112,000 acres of catchment area, which used to produce organic crops, mostly pulses by fulfilling its irrigation needs through floodwaters. Every year floodwaters irrigated a wide area, which was beneficial for the cultivation of organic crops, as one spell of floodwater was enough for every crop.

"Now we receive low floods, that too occasionally, which does not benefit the entire riverine lands. Secondly, super-floods bring destruction and displacement for the local communities," Nangraj said. He added that another thing adding to these issues was farmers’ switching to other major crops, except for some traditional organic ones. “They have installed tube wells for extracting underground water for cultivation," he said, adding that now there was a commercial and irrigated land in the catchment area. Only a small number of farmers produce organic crops, including chickpeas and other pulses, because no regulations in place anymore and the forest lands have been committed to certain powerful people for the production of major crops.

The new farmers and influentials have built their own illegal embankments to save their fields, creating a precarious situation for local communities. The government is yet to clean the illegal embankments and let the river flow naturally to the benefit of the land and its dwellers. It is very important as floods always bring nutrients that keep the soil fertile and rich.

These changes have cast uncertainties on the survival of the local people as floods cause them to face crop damage, displacement, and joblessness for months, depending on the level of destruction. They have so many horrible tales to tell from the floods of the recent years that books can be written out of them.

There is a dire need for research on irrigated and non-irrigated lands in the catchment area of the river. It may be the only way out to promote old varieties of crops like chickpea. Agronomists believe there are many options to improve its productivity, one being the use of modern farming technologies.

Ironically not much forest cover is left right now. The government has allotted the forest lands to political cronies, who have their own priorities and are producing other crops. Forest community women know the importance of leaves and green seeds of chickpeas, which they pick for sale and to cook at homes. Chickpeas have enormous nutritious value.

Presently, besides chickpeas, the riverine communities are cultivating peas, masoor (red lentil), and wheat as organic crops. Masoor's average per acre yield is around 25-30 maund and it is sold in the local market at around Rs5,000/maund. Onion is a new addition here. It was introduced three years back and producers look happy with its income. Similarly, coriander is another valuable crop of the area, which yields a produce of 15-25 maunds/acre and has a market value of Rs6,000/maund.