To prevent farmers from resorting to distress sales in a year that experts predict will see a bumper crop, the Indian West Bengal state’s Mamata Banerjee administration will purchase 1.10m tons of potatoes from them through cold storage facilities.

The government’s move, according to The Telegraph Online’s sources, is significant as it seeks to win over nearly 1.5m potato farmers throughout Bengal before the upcoming panchayat elections amid concerns that a significant number of them might be compelled to sell the produce at lower prices.

“The harvesting of potatoes has already started and a rough calculation by the agriculture department is that the state is likely to produce 15.4m tonnes of the crop this year. The projected production is around 40% more than the regular yield in Bengal. The government will take preventive measures to protect farmers from distress sales. The potato procurement is likely to be started from the second week of this month,” according to a senior Mamata Banerjee government official, mentioned by the above-mentioned media.

The government has planned to purchase potatoes from farmers at USD0.078 a kilo after calculating costs that include a small buffer of profit for them. Presently, farmers are selling their produce at Rs USD0,054-USD0,06 a kilo. A farmer can sell a maximum of 2.5 tons of potatoes to cold storages.

Experts say that a West Bengal farmer spends nearly USD1,138 to produce potatoes per one hectare of land and presently gets only USD806 by selling the crop.

The owners of the cold storage facilities will keep the purchased potatoes until the government approves a specific rate at which to sell the produce in phases.

Around 9,9m tons of potatoes are harvested in Bengal annually, and districts like Hooghly, East Burdwan, Bankura, and Murshidabad in south Bengal and North Dinajpur, Cooch Behar, Alipurduar and Jalpaiguri in north Bengal are considered prime producers.

The members of the Gram Sabha elect the ward members through a direct election. The Sarpanch or the president of the Gram Panchayat is elected by the ward members as per the State Act. The Sarpanch and the Panch are elected for five years. Gram Panchayat is governed by the elected body and administration.