SUGARCANE farmer Gopal Krishna says he has stopped harvesting his 25-acre farm in the Dramasi sector near Malele Village, Tavua, due to high transport costs to the mill.
Mr Krishna said he abandoned his harvest last year after rising transport expenses wiped out any chance of making a profit.
He said the cost of cutting and hauling cane by road has reached $57 per tonne, equal to the forecast price offered to farmers.
“There is no use continuing,” he said. “It is better we just do other agricultural work like cattle and vegetable farming. We cannot just rely on sugarcane.”
Mr Krishna said he bought his farm in 1997, but financial problems began in 2000 when the Fiji Sugar Corporation (FSC) stopped providing adequate rail transport, forcing a shift to commercial lorries.
He said transporting cane by tractor to a nearby rail link costs about $5 per tonne, while lorry transport to the Rarawai mill has risen to $20 per tonne.
Even with a small FSC subsidy, he said he still paid about $15.50 per tonne out of his pocket.
For a typical 200-tonne yield, he said the change in logistics costs him an extra $2000 to $3000 per season.
“That $2000 is money my family needs to survive on for four or five months and pay water, electricity, and phone bills.”
He said that even under the government’s top-up price of $85 per tonne, expenses such as labour, food, worker housing and cartage consumed about $60 per tonne, leaving only $25 for land rent and fertiliser.
