Plea to install turmeric quality detection kits

 CD Kumar, President, Erode Uzhavan Urpathiyalar Sangam (Farmers Producers' Association), has demanded that modern equipment be installed at the  Turmeric market at Erode, which is a major hub for turmeric in the world, to determine the quality of turmeric. 

He said ''Curcumin in turmeric has a medicinal value that increases its value.  But now according to the old practice the curcumin of turmeric is detected by breaking turmeric by hand.  Now sophisticated image processor and spectrophotometer kits can help detect the length, quality, age, moisture, curmin content of turmeric. This allows traders around the world to know the quality through the computer so that they can buy yellow online from many parts of the world by contacting the Erode Turmeric Market.  This will benefit traders and farmers.  Currently traders come directly to the Erode Market and participate in the auction.  Then they look at the turmeric directly and confirm its quality and buy it.  This difficulty will be reduced by knowing the quality through computer registration.  The Central products online under the National Agricultural Market Scheme.  

Through this the Erode District Regulated Markets have been funded.  A lot has been done to help the Perundurai Turmeric Market complex in particular.  So,  new modern kits can be set up there to detect the quality of turmeric.  The Central Government has introduced a scheme called One District-One Agricultural Crop.  Under this, turmeric has been declared for Erode district and it has come forward to help turmeric producers,  value added product manufacturers, farmers producers companies etc in various ways.

 Under the scheme, the kits can be given to the Sangam.  No one has so far benefited on a large scale in the  district under the scheme, he noted.  The Sangam is currently in the process of setting up a turmeric cluster to manufacture value added turmeric products through the SIDCO of State Government.  The state government will provide a grant of up to Rs 2.5 crore.  This will enable the Sangam to produce the highest quality turmeric powder and market it globally.  This will be of great benefit to farmers.  The Sangam propagated 6 to 7 month short duration Pragati and Pradeepa turmeric speciesh,  introducted by the central government owned research centre, and now many were cultivating this variety. Production is about 20 to 30 tons per acre.  On behalf of the State Government, the Chief Minister is about to launch Turmeric Research Center of TNAU at Bhavani Sagar through online. Another center through the Spices Board of the Central Government is going to be located near Modakkurichi.  The Bhavani Sagar Center can focus on productivuty  and the Modakkurichi Center  on post-harvest technology.  

At present, farmers store the turmeric in warehouses with keeping celphos tablets to protect it from pests .Sometimes the chemical mixes with the turmeric.  When that turmeric is used as a food item it causes harm.  Alternatively it is advisable to keep the turmeric in the cold storage units .But farmers follow the old method as using AC units is more expensive.  However, the use of sulphate and certain chemical gases in food preservatives has been banned in countries around the world.  Now, his sangam introduced US technology in keeping turmeric in air tight packs to protect them from pests. Farmers can sell it according to their need of money to make a profit.  

If this technology is  introduced at a subsidized price on behalf of the government, a large number of turmeric farmers in Erode will benefit.  The technology could be used by the government to protect other food grains also, as about 45 per cent of food grains are currently damaged by a number of factors, he said.