SHILLONG: Despite the nationwide lockdown due to COVID-19 outbreak, farmers in agriculture-rich district of Ri Bhoi are in good spirits, continuing their farming activities while following the health guidelines issued by the state.
Farmers of Ri Bhoi are major suppliers of fruits and vegetables besides foodgrains to a large part of the state and beyond.
Amid a lot of challenges, the farmers are playing a pivotal role in maintaining the food supply during the unprecedented fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s been 30 years since I started my involvement with agriculture and there has been no break so far,” said P Marwein of Mawtnum village in Ri Bhoi.
Agriculture is the sole source of livelihood for his entire family and they have continued farming even during lockdown albeit difficulties faced in marketing of their produce. “With multiple cropping, we carry out agriculture activities throughout the various seasons of the year,” he said.
Soon after harvesting paddy, Marwein and several other farmers in the village cultivate vegetables such as tomatoes, beans, capsicums and carrots.
These farmers in the remote village are not in the dark about social distancing rules and other protocols announced by Central and state governments.
“We are well aware of the guidelines such as social distancing and we follow them strictly both in the field and at home,” Marwein said.
However, getting the right price for their farm produce remains a huge challenge for most farmers due to lockdown and overall slowing down of the economy both at local and national level.
Being dependent hugely on tourism revenue, the state farmers have already suffered due to the sharp decline in demand of their produce as the tourism industry has come to a grinding halt due to the lockdown.
Farmers like Marwein in Meghalaya hope that the corona crisis gets over soon and tourism in the state revived soon so that they can get the right prices for their produce.
The Centre had earlier extended the lockdown by two more weeks till May 17.
