Alot (Madhya Pradesh): Leaseholder farmers in several villages of Alot town have started harvesting opium by slicing the mature pods of their standing crops starting this week.
In villages including Pipaliya Sisodiya and Patan, fields of licensed cultivators are in full bloom, with the extraction process underway for nearly a week.
Farmers said that while some have been harvesting opium latex for three to four days, others started nearly a week ago as the pods ripened.
Cultivators including Nandram Patidar of Pipaliya Sisodiya village, Radheshyam Patidar of Bamankhedi, Laxminarayan of Karadia, Dilipsingh Sisodiya of Jamunia Shankar, Ramesh Parmar of Joyan and Gordhan Patidar of Patan said that the production gets severely affected due to fluctuations in weather conditions and unseasonal rain.
They added that despite high input costs and intensive care from sowing to harvesting, expenses remain unchanged.
To protect the delicate crop, farmers have installed nets and curtains around and above the fields. They also regularly irrigate the crops, take disease control measures and maintain round-the-clock monitoring.
In some villages, small leaseholders have been instructed to submit pods directly without making incisions.
