Shimla, Sep 21 (IANS) Prolonged monsoon rains, landslides and poor road condition have hampered the transportation of apples from Himachal Pradesh.
‘Hundreds of trucks carrying apples have been stranded in various stretches in the upper Shimla region, especially in Jubbal, Rohru, Kotkhai, Chopal areas due to landslides in the past two days,’ Sanjay Chauhan, a prominent fruit grower based at Kotkhai, told IANS Tuesday.
‘The condition of roads is so bad that it took more than 12 hours to cover just 72 km from Kotkhai to Shimla instead of the normal two hours,’ he said, adding that truckers are refusing to ply their vehicles.
Others said the inclement weather and transportation problems have led to the rotting of apples.
‘Apples are being dumped in rivulets as these have started perishing,’ said Rajeev Gautam, a grower from Rohru.
Public Works Department (PWD) Minister Gulab Singh Thakur said heavy rain in the state has damaged roads and bridges.
‘Our estimates say the damage to roads and bridges was Rs.332 crore till Aug 31,’ he said.
The condition is reported to be the same in other apple-growing areas in Mandi, Kullu and Chamba districts.
Officials of the horticulture department said more than 75 lakh boxes are yet to be transported out of the state. Till date, over 2.80 crore standard boxes of apples have been sent to various markets, they said.
Manmohan Singh, director of the meteorological office here, said: ‘The monsoon has been plentiful this year as compared to last year. From June 1 to Sep 14, the state saw 816.6 mm of rain against the normal average of 741.1 mm, which means the state got 10 percent surplus rainfall.’
According to him, the monsoon normally starts retreating by the second week of September.
Apple is the main fruit crop of the state and is grown in nine out of 12 districts. More than 90 percent of the produce go to markets across the country.
The apple industry is estimated to be worth about Rs.1,500 crore (Rs.15 billion).
