Weather spoilsport in Junagadh

The weather has played spoilsport for the mango crop in Junagadh district known for the delicious Kesar variety. Farmers had hoped for a bumper crop because of good flowering. However, they now fear huge losses as green, unripe fruits are falling from the trees.

Recently, the Talala APMC market was flooded with unripe mangoes. These fruits fell prematurely because of the climate change in the last couple of days. The sudden rise in temperature has led to this phenomenon according to farmers and horticulture experts. They say that because of good flowering the branches were loaded with 100% crop. But the heat wave is destroying it.

"In the APMC market we sold unripe fruits used to make pickles at Rs25 per kg compared to Rs150 a kg last year. Farmers don't know the exact scientific reason but we believe it's the climate that is playing spoilsport," said Harsukh Jarsaniya, secretary, APMC, Talala.

Junagadh Agricultural University's vice-chancellor NC Patel told DNA that climate change had delayed the crop by more than 40 days. The juicy Kesar will be available in the market by May 15. He advised farmers to spray a mixture of urea (200g) and naphthaleneacetic acid (5 ml) with 10 litres of water to check the falling of immature mangoes.