The battle of Koorachundu

By initiating a mass movement to restore coconut prices, hit primarily by large-scale imports of palmolein, a Kerala village makes a beginning in grassroots-level action to shore up the precarious agricultural economy of the State.

KOORACHUNDU, 50 km to the hills from the bustle of Kozhikode city, is yet another village and a market on a bumpy road - about a hundred small shops down a parish church, and beyond, small houses spread out in a jungle of coconut, arecanut and rubber tre es. It would seem hardly the place to launch a mass movement.

Yet, this village, comprising largely families of farmers who migrated decades ago from central Kerala, is now a champion of the swadeshi cause. It is perhaps the first village in the country where a spontaneous movement has emerged for a total bo ycott of relatively cheap, imported palmolein (oil) and encouragement to the use of coconut oil as a cooking medium. Coke and Pepsi have long since disappeared from shop shelves here. Instead, customers who ask for a soft drink are invited to helpings of tender coconut water and impromptu lectures on the virtues of the natural drink. According to local activists, the village will soon launch a campaign for making soap using coconut oil. Three brands of 'soap-kits' are already doing the rounds. The inten ded slogan: "Save the coconut grower, fetch him a fair price."

By September, as a result of various factors, including excess supply, low-duty import of large quantities of palmolein, and a fall in domestic consumption, the price of coconut oil had touched the lowest point in a decade - Rs.2,825 a quintal. Coconut p rices plummeted and, in the land of coconuts farmers found it profitable to sell tender coconuts at Rs.5 to Rs.10 rather than mature coconuts at Rs.2.

This happened in the context of the devastating effect the New Economic Policy, launched in 1991, has had on the agricultural economy of Kerala. Major plantation crops such as tea, rubber, coffee and cardamom, in which the State has a substantial stake, are facing a similar crisis. Kerala accounts for nearly 56 per cent of the total area under coconut cultivation and for 45 per cent of the coconut production in the country. While the area under coconut cultivation increased, demand for coconut oil fell in the State, again, among other factors, because of the uncontrolled import of the cheaper palmolein. The result was a crisis affecting more then 35 lakh coconut growers and the fortunes of other segments such as copra makers and traders, millers and co conut oil traders. When all seemed lost, Koorachundu showed the way.

"It all started with a discussion a few youth, all farmer-traders affected by the fall in prices, had during one of their many trips to Kozhikode to take part in a farmers' dharna in front of the Collectorate against the 'anti-farmer policies' of the Cen tral government," said Maximin Arakkal, president of the Koorachundu unit of the Farmers Action Front. "It struck us that although the import of palmolein affected us very much, the real problem lay not in its import but in the large-scale use of the imp orted oil in the land of coconuts. We ourselves were the cause of our misery, in a way. That was when we decided that we had to stop it through some positive action."

The first task of the 14-member "action council", constituted to head the movement, was to enlist the support of the traders. "The response from the president of the powerful traders' organisation in the State, the Kerala Vyapari Vyavasayi Ekopana Samiti , was surprisingly very positive. He agreed to provide us all support if we launched our no-palmolein campaign and if we succeeded in enlisting similar support elsewhere," Maximin said.

Within weeks Koorachundu was ready to rid itself of the imported oil. "We were careful not to force our views on others, but by enlisting the support of the leaders of the organised classes - headload workers, drivers and traders - and also of the parish priest, we were able to launch a people's movement within weeks. An informal survey carried out in the village was an eye-opener. Only about 10 per cent of the palmolein sold in the village market was being used by households. The rest was being bought by restaurants and small eateries. We soon found that people were being forced to consume food cooked using palmolein by these restaurants," Maximin said.

Fr. Augustine Kizhakkarrakkattu of the church in the village, the St. Thomas Catholic church, said that for two or three successive Sundays in September he had set apart five to 10 minutes of his sermon to make the parishioners aware of the problem. They responded enthusiastically. (Christians constitute about 70 per cent of the residents. The rest are mostly families of Muslim farmer-traders.) A series of public meetings and rallies at the village market did the trick. On Gandhi Jayanti Day, after givi ng more than a month for the traders to sell their existing stocks, the village was declared "hundred per cent palmolein-free".

Joy Vengathanam, secretary of the action council, said: "The restaurant owners' first response was to say that they would have to increase the price of food when it was cooked in coconut oil. But we insisted that it would then be the end of the campaign for the common good. Eventually, the 17 restaurants and tea shops in the village agreed to let go of additional profits." Today, most of the restaurants display on their glass-paned shelves the slogan: 'Cooking only in coconut oil.'

N.K. Joy, the proprietor of the largest provision store in the village, said that he used to sell 120 kg of palmolein a week. He said the self-imposed ban on palmolein had not affected his profits as there had been a corresponding increase in the sale of coconut oil. Another shopkeeper, Sunny Planthottam, said that he had sold at least Rs.1,000 worth of soft drinks a month before October. "We do not sell soft drinks now. Instead, the sale of tender coconut fetched nearly Rs.2,500 last week," he said.

Oil mills all over the State were facing a crisis of under-utilisation of capacity. While the industry requires eight lakh tonnes of copra a year for capacity utilisation, production in the State was only around 4.5 lakh tonnes, of which, nearly two lakh tonnes was exported to other States. Kerala's oil mills had to manage with the remaining 2.5 lakh tonnes. The low price and the lack of demand for coconut oil had made business unprofitable.

Thomson, an oil mill owner at Koorachundu, said that in early September, he decided to sell his mill as business had become dull. His mill produced merely 30 kg of oil a day. Since October, the average production a day has increased to 150 kg and on most days the mill works late into the night.

Fr. Augustine said: "We meant it initially as a symbolic protest. But look at the way it caught the imagination of the people. It has the potential to spread all over India, where farmers are facing a bleak future because of the skewed policies of the go vernment."

In the first week of October itself, four other villages in Koorachundu panchayat were declared 'palmolein-free'. Drawing inspiration from the awareness campaign in the village, a rally and dharna of farmers was organised in front of the Kochi port in ea rly October. In a symbolic protest, former Prime Ministers V.P. Singh and H.D. Deve Gowda emptied palmolein packets on the streets and called for a boycott of imported agricultural products.

The campaign for the boycott of palmolein spread fast and was most effective in the districts of northern Kerala. In some places, the agitation became violent when demonstrators raided shops and destroyed stocks of palmolein. But by and large the campaig n was peaceful and the boycott voluntary, with traders, farmers' organisations, religious leaders, voluntary organisations and political parties such as the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and its youth wing, the Democratic Youth Federation of India ( DYFI) and panchayat bodies lending support to it. As part of the campaign, tender coconut stalls are being set up all over Kerala to enable farmers to get a better price for their produce and as an alternative to branded soft drinks.

According to the Coconut Oil Merchants Association, the annual edible oil requirement of Kerala is about 2.4 lakh tonnes and the total amount of palmolein imported annually is around two lakh tonnes. Palmolein was dumped in Kerala and it slowly took over the edible oil market and often led to wide fluctuations in the price of coconut oil, it said.

According to Jose Cheruvally, a trader in Koorachundu and a State committee member of the Kerala Vyapari Vyavasayi Ekopana Samiti, the boycott launched in the village has in two months affected palmolein sales in Kozhikode, Malappuram, Kannur and Thrissu r districts, largely with the support of traders and panchayat samitis. A wholesale trader in Kozhikode said that the sale of palmolein had come down by 75 per cent in the district.

N.K. Mohammed Ali, managing director of the Parisons group of companies, a major importer of palmolein in Kerala, said in Kozhikode that the anti-palmolein campaign and its success in places such as Koorachundu had affected palmolein sales. According to him, the sale of palmolein has come down by about 50 per cent all over Kerala. "The problem is confined to Kerala now. We have stopped the import of palmolein through the Kochi port and have confined our operations to the Mangalore port. The oil bought t hus is refined and sold outside Kerala," said Mohammed Ali.

The question is, will the decision taken by the residents of Koorachundu on October 2 not to use palmolein hold? Mohammed Ali says it will not, because the campaign is based on the "wrong premise" that the fall in the price of coconut oil is because of t he import of palmolein. "There is a shortage of edible oil in the country, and 45 per cent of our requirements are met through imports. The copra available for the production of coconut oil is enough to meet only 3.5 per cent of India's total requirement of edible oils. It is only in Kerala that coconut oil is used for cooking. In several other States it is used by industries in the production of soaps and other cosmetic products. The price of coconut oil therefore depends on a lot of other factors, inc luding the supply of copra to mill owners by NAFED (National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation)," he said.

According to Mohammed Ali, a comparison of the prices in the last few years shows that the prices of coconut oil and palmolein are not linked to each other. "While the price of palmolein is more sensitive to trends in the international market, the price of coconut oil is sensitive to Indian markets. While in May 1998 the prices of a kilogram of palmolein and coconut oil were Rs.40 and Rs.39 respectively, in November 1999 they were Rs.20 and Rs.56 respectively, and in October 2000, Rs.20 and Rs.31 respec tively. Currently, the price of coconut oil in the international market is only Rs.14.50. The domestic use of coconut oil is minimal, the major users being hotel owners and industries. For hotels what matters is the fact that palmolein is cheaper and has a longer shelf life than coconut oil. If they say that the import of palmolein is to be stopped, the customer will have to depend on other edible oils, such as sunflower oil or soybean oil, which are costlier," he said.

But says Maximin: "For years we have been listening to such explanations by one lobby or the other. But the lot of the farmer has only been going from bad to worse. Our protest is not against the import of palmolein, over which we have no control. It is to make the customer in Kerala aware of the incongruity of his complaints, when he himself refuses to use coconut oil or tender-coconut and complains about the slump in coconut prices. In our own way we have tried to show what we can do to improve the lo t of the coconut farmer. Such grassroots-level movements are going to spread all over the country, wherever the helpless farmer is being run over by unsympathetic, globally driven policy changes."