Indian Rubber Growers Association (IRGA) today urged an urgent intervention of the central and state governments to initiate steps to ‘save’ rubber growers. The association has also asked the local tyre manufacturers to buy rubber from India at the landed cost of imported rubber. Otherwise, the growers have threatened to boycott domestic tyre manufacturers and resort to buying of cheaper imported tyres, the same way as the raw material is being imported by the tyre industry.
Sibi J Monippalli, president, IRGA, urged the Union government to immediately increase the import duty to 25 per cent from the current 20 per cent, as an urgent measure. He has asked the Kerala government should prop up the rubber procurement in order to improve local prices. He also urged to explore the possibility of rubberisation of 20 per cent of the roads in Kerala every year.
Meanwhile, Kerala finance minister K M Mani said that the Centre should allot Rs 1,000 crore from the price stabilisation fund for procurement operations. In a letter to Nirmala Seetharaman, Minister of Commerce, he said the Centre should ban imports until the price stabilises in the local market.
Sibi said, the Indian rubber sector had registered phenomenal growth in terms of the area under cultivation, production, productivity in the last 60 years. The area under cultivation was only 71,336 hectares in 1947 which increased to around 750,000 hectares in 2014-15. The production which was 15,000 tones, touched 913,000 tonnes in 2013.
Productivity also increa-sed from a very low level of 210 kgs per hectare in 1947 to 1,863 kgs per hectare in the 2013. This growth was possible due to the hard work of rubber growers, supported by governments and institutions like Rubber Board.
The association accused the companies in the tyre sector of trying to cash in on the miseries of the rubber farmers. The current crisis, due to a drop in price in the international market, is being used as an opportunity to dump cheap rubber into the domestic market to depress the domestic prices. All tyre companies have been generating enormous profits, to the tune of Rs 300 crore each quarter, it added.
“It is time that these companies introspect and come forward to support Indian farmers by buying from domestic market at the landed cost of imported rubber. It is pertinent to note the bill of entry of imports indicate that the landed cost of imported rubber is Rs 135-140 per kg, whereas the domestic market price is Rs 115 per kg, IRGA said in a statement.
– business-standard.com
