Panamaram: Oil palm cultivation, once promoted as a promising venture for farmers in Wayanad, is now falling apart. Across the district, plantations lie abandoned, overrun with wild growth, as collapsing prices, lack of buyers, and crop diseases force farmers to give up on a crop they once believed would secure their future.

 With no one harvesting, the nuts sprout and fall off the palms. And those that fall at the base of large palms grow naturally, leaving plots densely covered with palms. Birds feeding on the outer shell of ripe nuts have also become a major nuisance.

Across the district, several farmers cut down coconut and areca palms to replace them with oil palms, expecting huge profits. However, the absence of buyers, falling prices and diseases affecting oil palms pushed them into crisis. A lack of knowledge about harvesting further worsened the situation. The government gradually winding up programmes intended to popularise oil palm farming also dashed hopes.

Large-scale oil palm cultivation was undertaken in Vaithiri, Chelodu, and Panamaram in the district. Many of these farms are now over 15 years old. Farmers recall that earlier there were procurement centres and buyers for oil palm nuts, which were used for paint, oil, and other products. Today, they have all disappeared.

Since oil palms are leafy, other crops cannot be cultivated nearby. Farmers’ only relief is that, apart from monkeys, other wild animals stay away. Oil palm farming is profitable abroad. Local farmers demand that the government should take steps to procure ripe palm nuts at a reasonable price, especially since it was the government that initially promoted oil palm cultivation.