Price of coconuts drops to ₹22,000 a tonne in Salem

SALEM Following widespread rain, wholesale price of coconuts has dropped to ₹22,000 a tonne in Sal

Following widespread rain, wholesale price of coconuts has dropped to ₹22,000 a tonne in Salem.

Traders fear that the price might decrease further in the future.

In Salem district, people welcome the first day of the Tamil month of Aadi with a custom called  Thengai Suduthal (coconut roasting). People roast coconut filled with rice flakes, jaggery, sesame seeds, fried gram and other items in every household on that day. Hence, sale of coconut used to be high on that day.

K.M. Arumugam, a wholesale coconut trader at VOC market, said Salem market got coconuts from Erode and Coimbatore districts. This year, cultivation of coconuts increased with good rain. On the first day of Aadi last year, price of a coconut (weighing 500 g to 800 g) was ₹30 to ₹40. This year, the price of a similar size coconut was ₹20 to ₹22 in the Salem market. The cost of small coconuts (seven numbers) was ₹50, he said.

“Now, one tonne of coconut is sold for ₹22,000. Last year, it was sold for ₹30,000. There will be approximately 3,000 medium-sized coconuts and around 2,000 large-sized coconuts. The traders fear that with the growing areas continuing to get good rain, production will increase and the price may fall further to ₹18,000 to ₹20,000 a tonne in the next 12 months. In the Salem retail market, the price of coconut will fall to ₹10 to ₹12 a piece if this trend continues for a year,” Mr. Arumugam added.