Category Archives: Agriculture

MRC former Chairman M.W. Chinnappa no more

Agriculture, Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Business & Economy, Coffee News, Famous Personalities of Kodagu / Coorg, Leaders

Thithimathi (Kodagu) :

ChinnappaKF15jul2013Maneyapanda W. Chinnappa (89), former Chairman of Mysore Race Club (MRC) and a coffee planter in Devarapura Hebbale village near here, passed away last evening.

He is survived by his wife, two sons, a daughter, grandchildren and a large number of relatives.

Last rites were performed at Devarapura village today.

He was the MRC Chairman during 1985-87. He was also the member of Sports Club and JWGC.

source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> General News / July 05th, 2013

Rainfall abates in Kodagu district, except Madikeri

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Green Initiatives / Environment, Nature

Rainfall abated further in all other places in Kodagu district except Madikeri on Sunday and the rivers that were in spate receded. The average rainfall in Kodagu district from 8 a.m. on Saturday and 8 a.m. on Sunday was 39.41 mm.

Madikeri city received 123 mm rainfall in the period between 8 a.m. on Saturday and 8 a.m. on Sunday.

Sampaje hobli in Madikeri taluk continued to receive heavy rainfall in the district with 140.8 mm. Bhagamandala hobli recorded 76 mm rainfall followed by Shantalli hobli receiving 51.2 mm rainfall.

HARANGI FULL

The inflow into the Harangi reservoir was at the rate of 11,600 cusecs on Sunday and the outflow was at the rate of 8,050 cusecs.

The water-level in the Harangi reservoir stood at 2,855.40 ft as against the maximum reservoir level of 2,859 ft. The water-level during the corresponding period last year was 2,820.06 ft.

AVERAGE RAINFALL

The average rainfall in Kodagu district from January 2013 till July 7 at 8 a.m. is 1,312.76 mm as against 643.47 mm rainfall during the same period last year.

Madikeri taluk received an average rainfall of 1,951.10 mm from January till July 7 at 8 a.m. It was 894.22 mm in the corresponding period last year.

Madikeri taluk recorded an average rainfall of 91.10 mm in the period between 8 a.m. on Saturday and 8 a.m. on Sunday.

Virajpet taluk recorded an average rainfall of 968.90 mm from January till July 7 as against 551.03 mm in the same period last year. Somwarpet taluk recorded an average rainfall of 1,017.07 mm from January till July 7 as against 485.16 mm rainfall in the corresponding period last year, according to meteorological department sources.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> National> Karnataka / by Special Correspondent / Mysore – July 08th, 2013

Deputy commissioner surveys encroached canal

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Green Initiatives / Environment, Records, All

Madikeri :

The high court has recently directed the Kodagu administration to conduct a survey to find out about the encroachment of a canal and to send a report to the high court for further action. PuggeraRevathiChengappa of T Shettigeri village in South Kodagu had filed a petition requesting the authorities to evict the encroachers.

In response to the court direction, deputy commissioner N V Prasad, along with assistant commissioner G Prabhu, Virajpet taluk tahasildar Arogya Meri, visited the spot. They have identified the encroached area with the help of surveyors.

The canal was formed 60 years back. Recently some persons have encroached on the canal, adding it to their land. They have closed the canal which was formed to use by farmers for farming activities. The encroachers have built a commercial complex, houses and also have formed sites for business purpose. All these issues were mentioned in the petition.

The officers said that a detailed survey report along with the identification sketches will be submitted to the high court.

source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Mysore / TNN / July 06th, 2013

Growers to now sell coffee online

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Coffee, Kodagu (Coorg)

CoffeeKF07jul2013
The Coffee Board of India, an autonomous body under the commerce ministry, has signed an agreement with the National Spot Exchange Ltd (NSEL) to launch a warehouse receipt-based electronic spot market for coffee beans. This is a first-of-its-kind initiative by the Board to provide an opportunity for better price realisation and educate growers about quality assessment. Currently, Rs 2,000 crore worth of is traded in physical form at the farm gate. Agents of exporters collect the beans at estates and transport it for curing (drying and de-husking of coffee beans). Earlier, ABN Amro and ITC had tried to provide online trading platforms for coffee, which did not work well, said growers.

According to the agreement, NSEL will conduct online trading beans for both raw and cleaned coffee. It has tied up with companies for curing after the online transaction. NSEL has set up two warehouses at Kushalnagar in Kodagu district and Chikmagalur in Chikmagalur district for storing coffee on behalf of the growers.

“The aim of this partnership is to ensure that small and medium coffee growers get an opportunity to sell their coffee online. We will provide them quality assessment and grading facilities at their farm gate with the help of the Coffee Board. The growers are free to fix their own prices. There will be no fee for the growers for online trading. We will charge the buyers a small commission,” said an NSEL official.

The partnership between the Board and NSEL is also aimed at providing market linkages and relevant back-end infrastructure, education, training and technical advice to growers. The Coffee Board will carry a mobile laboratory to conduct the grading of coffee beans at the farm gate. The price will be discovered based on transparent electronic bidding. After the online trading is carried out, NSEL will deliver the beans at the doorstep of buyers or curing works through its transport network, the official added. The NSEL is also in the process of providing finance. Federal Bank, Standard Chartered and ICICI Bank, among others, have approached NSEL for providing finance on the warehouse receipts.

Ramesh Rajah, president of Coffee Exporters’ Association of India, said: “It is an excellent idea. The seller will know how much price he will get for his coffee. However, there are many glitches involved in online trading.” He said issues such as Rule 7B, VAT and transaction costs will have to be sorted. As the sale of cured coffee attracts taxation, growers will not come forward to sell through online platform. NSEL and the Board will have to sort out these issues, said Rajah.

source: http://www.business-standard.com / Business Standard / Home> Markets> Commodities> Food & Edible Oils / by BS Reporter / Bangalore – June 28th, 2013

Harangi reservoir reaches brim, almost

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Green Initiatives / Environment, Nature, Records, All

HarangiKF03jul2013
The Harangi reservoir in the taluk is just two feet away from reaching its maximum level. On Monday, the level stood at 2,857.14 feet, against a maximum level of 2,859 feet.

A total of 400 cusecs of water is being released from the dam since morning. The inflow into the reservoir stood at 3,600 cusecs at 8.30 am. The present storage in the reservoir is 7.65 tmc feet against the total capacity of eight tmc feet.

The reservoir had reached its brim in August last year. But this time, the rainy season has begun a month early, facilitating good inflow into the dam. Engineers manning the dam said that the irrigation consultative committee would meet on July 15, after which water would be released to the canals for irrigation. Releasing water to the canals would irrigate 1.37 lakh acres of land.

source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> State / DHNS – Kushalnagar (Kodagu Dist.) / July 01st, 2013

Coffee Board ties up with NSEL for electronic spot market for coffee beans

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Coffee News, Coffee, Kodagu (Coorg)

CoffeeKF02jul2013
This is the first initiative taken by the Board to provide an opportunity for better price realisation

Coffee Board of India, an autonomous body under the ministry of commerce, has signed a memorandum of understanding with National Spot Exchange (NSEL) to launch a warehouse receipt based electronic spot market for coffee beans. This is the first of its kind initiative taken by the Board to provide an opportunity for better price realization and educate them about quality assessment.

Currently, over Rs 2,000 crore worth of coffee is traded in physical form at the farm gate level. Agents of exporters collect the beans at the estates and transport it for curing. Earlier, ABN AMRO and ITC had tried to provide online trading platforms for coffee, which did not work well, the coffee growers said.

As per the MoU, the NSEL will conduct online trading of coffee beans for both raw and cleaned coffee. It has tied up with coffee curing companies for curing of coffee post the online transaction. NSEL has set up two warehouses at Kushalnagar in Kodagu district and Chikmagalur in Chikmagalur district for storing coffee on behalf of the growers.

“The aim of this partnership is to ensure that small and medium coffee growers get an opportunity to sell their coffee online. We will provide them quality assessment and grading facilities at their farm gate with the help of Coffee Board. The growers are free to fix their own prices. There will be no fee to the growers for online trading. We will charge the buyers a small commission,” an official of NSEL said.

The partnership between Coffee Board and NSEL is also aimed at providing market linkages and relevant back-end infrastructure, education, training and technical advice to growers. The Coffee Board will carry a mobile laboratory to conduct the grading of coffee beans at the farm gate. The price will be discovered based on transparent electronic bidding. After the online trading is carried out, NSEL will deliver the beans at the doorstep of buyers or curing works through its transport network, he said.

The NSEL is also in the process of providing finance. Federal Bank, Standard Chartered and ICICI Bank among others have approached NSEL for providing finance on the warehouse receipts.

Ramesh Rajah, president, Coffee Exporters’ Association of India said, “It is an excellent idea. The seller will know how much price he will get for his coffee. However, there are many glitches involved in online trading.”

He said issues like Rule 7B, VAT and transaction costs would have to be sorted out properly. As the sale of cured coffee attracts taxation, the growers will not come forward to sell through online platform. The NSEL and Coffee Board will have to sort out these issues, he said.

NSEL has till now added 54 commodities on its online spot-trading platform.

source: http://www.business-standard.com / Business Standard / Home> Companies> News / by Mahesh Kulkarni / Bangalore – June 28th, 2013

South west monsoon active once again

About Kodagu / Coorg, Agriculture, Business & Economy, Nature

Mysore :

Sudden depression in bay of Bengal coupled with intensified south west monsoon has brought cheers on the farmers and water resource officials as the region failed to receive much rain last week. On Monday suddenly the skies opened up and rain started pouring .

Meanwhile, Kodagu district administration has declared holiday for the schools and colleges on Tuesday in the wake of heavy rain being witnessed by the region. Even Mysore district received rain on Monday.

Along with the farmers , the engineers of the water resource department who were worried about the dwindled inflow into the dams are a relived lot with the inflow into all the four dams in the Cauvery delta increasing considerably.

Especially the inflow into KRS dam which slumped down to less than 3500 cusecs after a week of inflow ranging between 10000 and 15000 . This is expected to increase by tomorrow morning following heavy rain in Kodagu district , the core area of the Cauvery catchment . An engineer of the water resource department said the inflow into KRS dam was 3223 cusecs on Monday evening against an outflow of 1195 with the dam’s level standing at 79.96 ft against the maximum height 124.80 ft.

However inflow is anticipated to rise considerably by tomorrow afternoon with the rain lashing the Cauvery catchment area , the engineer added.. According to director state meteorology department Puttanna though the Kodagu is yet to record heavy rainfall, district is expected to receive more rain in the coming days. “Today, the rain is more due to low pressure in bay of Bengal and from tomorrow onwards the monsoon rain will continue to occur” he added .

Last year average rainfall in Kodagu in June was 375.6 mm, but this year it has recorded 498.4 mm rainfall and this has raised hopes of region receiving good rain this year . Even inflow into Kabini dam increased suddenly on Monday evening with inflow reaching 11968 cusecs with the water crossing 2275.50 ft mark against the dam’s maximum height of 2284. A dam engineer told TOI that the inflow may increase and cross 16000 cusecs by Tuesday morning due to reports of Kerala’s Waynad district receiving heavy rain in the last 12 hours. Even the water level in the Harangi dam is slowly inching towards it’s maximum height of 2859 ft with the level on Monday evening standing at 2831 .45 ft . with an inflow of 1095 cusecs . ” Water level in Kabini dam may reach it’s maximum level in next four five days if the inflow continues to remain at 16000 cusecs” the engineer added.

source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Mysore / by MB Maramkal, TNN / June 24th, 2013

Sethuraman estate gets US certification for robusta coffee

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Coffee News, Records, All, World Opinion

Bangalore :

Indian coffee estates are moving slowly to gain US’ roasters interest.

As a first step, the Sethuraman Estates located at Magundi in Chikmagalur after showcasing its produce at various speciality coffee events in the US has now become the first Indian coffee estate to get ‘R Grade’ certificate.

‘R Grade’ certificate are given for washed robusta coffees by the Coffee Quality Institute (CQI) which is an arm of Speciality Coffee Association of America (SCAA).

getting premium

The SCAA recently tested Sethuraman Estate’s robusta coffee submission at the CQI and found to have all the required quality parameters. This certificate facilitates the estate to sell and charge a high premium in the US .

The certificate and recognition allows Sethuraman Estates to sell its entire submission of 15 tonnes speciality robusta in the US market spread over a year by using the CQI and SCAA logo.

“The ‘single-origin estate-branded’ coffee of Sethuram Estates has so far fetched a premium of over 30 per cent over the domestic market prices. Currently the domestic washed robusta coffees is trading at Rs 145 a kg,” said Nishant R. Gurjer, Managing Partner, Sethuraman Estates.

entering US

“This certificate and recognition will allow us to enter the lucrative US café market as well,” he added.

The Sethuraman estate located at Chikmagalur began in operations in the 1950s. In the US market, the company is marketing estate-branded coffees – the Sitara Parchment Robusta and the Ne Plus Ultra of Robusta coffee brands.

The US, a traditionally arabica-consuming country, is slowly replacing it with robusta coffees and few companies have initiated moves to source from various countries for create blends.

shift to robusta

This has led to the Coffee Quality Institute, which used to certify only Arabica coffees, now has introduced separate certification for robusta coffees.

ratings

According to the institute’s finding of Sethuraman Estates, the following are the rating with baseline score of 7.14. Aroma 7.58 , flavour 7.42, aftertaste 7.42, acidity 7.83, mouth feel 7.42, balance 7.50, Uniformity 10, clean cup 10 Sweetness 7.42 cupper points 7.58.

Gurjer said, “We entered the US market in 2006 by exporting just two containers (36 tonnes) and so far have reached the level of 8 containers (144 tonnes) of speciality robusta coffees.”

source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com / Business Line / Home / by Anil Urs anil.u@thehindu.co.in / Bangalore – June 21st, 2013

Success: Soliga tribe’s forest rights upheld in court

About Kodagu / Coorg, Agriculture, Green Initiatives / Environment, Nature

Tribal peoples like the Soliga have been living with and protecting the wildlife in their forests for countless generations. / © Kalyan Varma/Survival
Tribal peoples like the Soliga have been living with and protecting the wildlife in their forests for countless generations. /
© Kalyan Varma/Survival

A village belonging to the Soliga tribe in southern India has won an important court victory after its entire stock of honey – its key source of livelihood – was seized by local forestry officials in May. The community, with the support of local organizations, took the matter to court – and won.

A Soliga man told Survival, ‘In my village, Hosapodu, we are very happy that we can continue with our work’.

The confiscation of honey was in direct violation of the 2006 Indian Forest Rights Act, which recognizes the rights of India’s tribal peoples, such as the Soliga, to live in and from their forests, and protect and manage their land.

Tribal peoples like the Soliga have been living with and protecting the wildlife in their forests for countless generations. However many forestry officials still believe that forest and tiger conservation requires the removal of all people from the forests. These prejudices often make foresters unwilling to respect tribal rights – especially the right to make a livelihood from the forest. The recent court victory exposes this injustice and the necessity for the rights of India’s tribes to be respected.

The Soliga tribe of Karnataka made history in 2011 when their rights to their forests were recognized, even though they lie inside a tiger reserve. The community has been caring for the forest and harvesting its produce – including honey – for countless generations. After their rights were recognized one village established a collective to get a fair price for their honey.

More Soliga villages are awaiting the recognition of their forest rights and local organizations Keystone, Atree and the Soliga Abhivriddhi Sangha (Soliga Peoples’ Collective) are supporting them in the process.

Despite severe constraints from forestry officials, the Soliga remain determined to manage, harvest and protect their forests sustainably for current and future generations.

source: http://www.survivalinternational.org / Survival / Home / June 19th, 2013

Kodagu gets copious rainfall

Agriculture, Business & Economy, Green Initiatives / Environment, Nature, Records, All

Landslides reported from various parts of the district
The rains have intensified in Kodagu district. All taluks including Madikeri received heavy rainfall on Monday.

The overflowing ponds, streams and rivers have brought smiles on the faces of farmers. Rise in the water level in Kootuhole check dam, Chikli and Harangi reservoirs have helped to solve water crisis in the district. Vehicle users were put to hardship on water logged roads.

RainsKF20jun2013
Landslides have been reported from different parts of the district. There has been disruption in power supply following damage to electric wires. Kodagu district recorded an average of 39.65 mm rainfall till 8 am on Monday, whereas that received on the same day last year was 25.65 mm. The district has received 560.28 mm rain from January till date, against 291.47 mm rain recorded last year. Madikeri taluk has received 56.40 mm rainfall in the last 24 hours, Virajpet taluk — 36.38 mm and Somwarpet taluk — 26.18 mm rainfall.

The water level at Harangi reservoir on Monday was 2817.31 ft as against the maximum level of 2859 ft.

Telemetric rain gauges

Kodagu district has 48 telemetric rain gauges, of which 38 rain guages are functioning. The gauges are located at Sudarshan guest house, Avandur, Bhagamandala, Galibeedu, Karada, Mundrotu, Napoklu, Naladi, Sampaje, Talacauvery, Moornadu and Dabbadka in Madikeri taluk, Somwarpetm Koodige, Kushalnagar, Madapura, Shanivarsanthe, Suntikoppa, Harangi, Shanthalli, Soorlabi, Koodlipet in Somwarpet taluk, Virajpet, Ammathi, Kurchi, Karmadu, Kallalla, Maldare, Mathigodu, Moorkallu, Nagarahole, Ponnampet IB, Srimangala, Thithimathi, Siddhapura in Virajpet taluk.

The telemetric centres at Karike, jail in Madikeri, Anekadu, Dubare, Huduguru, Kargodu in Somwarpet taluk, Balekovu, Devamachi, Makutta, Vatekolli in Virajpet taluk have been damaged.The State has proposed to install telemetric rain gauges in 98 gram panchayats in the district, of which 23 rain gauges have been already installed, said District Statistician Prameela.

In the backdrop of heavy rains forecast by the meteorological department, Additional Deputy Commissioner (In-charge) G Prabhu, in a press release has said that head teachers have been entrusted with the responsibility of declaring holidays to schools.

source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> District / DHNS – Madikeri, June 17th, 2013