Cooperative marketing society does well in turmeric sales

Friday, 19 June 2009 04:49 administrator
Print

Source : The Hindu Date : 19.06.2009

Cooperative marketing society does well in turmeric sales

Karthik Madhavan

“The Society declares 14 per cent dividend every year”

PHOTO: M. GOVARTHAN

Farmers’ friend: Agriculture Producers Cooperative Marketing Society has helped turmeric farmers get a good price and has won a prize for its turmeric powder. –

ERODE: Erode Agriculture Producers’ Cooperative Marketing Society, Erode CMS in short, has won the first prize at a national level spices competition.

The CMS recently participated in the Jaipur Rashtriya Sahakar Masala Mela 2009 and won the prize for its turmeric powder, adjudged best.

The CMS sells the turmeric powder under the ‘Mangalam’ brand.

The Society manufactures the powder by purchasing from farmers, who sell the produce at its auction yard. “The Society, just like any trader, participates through secret tender in auction to buy the turmeric required for powder manufacture,” says the Society’s Special Officer K. Jaganathan.

It then crushes the turmeric at the in-house factory, which has a machine with an installed capacity of 1,300 tonnes.

The society sells the powder on a regular basis to the District Consumer Cooperative Wholesale Store, Chinthamani, and Tirchengode Cooperative Wholesale Store.

PDS

The CMS has also sold the turmeric powder to the Government to be distributed through PDS as part of the Rs. 50-a-spices-pack scheme.

“The Society sold 18 lakh packets for Rs. 54 lakh,” the Special Officer says.

But then the turmeric powder sales is only a part of the Cooperative Marketing Society’s activities. The main function is to help turmeric farmers get a good price.

Every day, hundreds of farmers go to the Society’s premises, exhibit their produce, to which the traders quote a price. Trader with the highest price quoted gets the produce.

In providing the service, the Society collects a 1.5 per cent fee from the farmers, which it uses to maintain the premises, protect the farmers’ stock and pay employees.

So good as been the cooperative organisation’s services that since its formation in 1960 it has been running on profit. And declaring dividends as well. “The Society declares 14 per cent dividend every year,” the SO says. In the last financial year it earned Rs. 45.60 lakh in profit and the year before Rs. 31.01 lakh.

On an average the Society gets 8,000 to 9,000 tonnes of turmeric a year.

Mr. Jaganathan attributes the success to the directions from founder S.K. Paramasivan, former MP, and other farmer leaders.

Last Updated on Friday, 19 June 2009 05:26