Shillong Apr 24: Meghalaya Governor, Ganga Prasad launched a five-year Mission Lakadong 2018-2023 to lend exclusive focus on one of Meghalaya’s well known spices, the Lakadong turmeric, also known as the “golden spice” and put in place targeted interventions to improve livelihood of turmeric farmers.

The famous Lakadong turmeric is cultivated at Lakadong village in West Jaiñtia Hills district and other nearby villages in the district.

The Lakadong Mission was launched by the Governor at a function held at the State Convention Centre in the presence of Mookaïaw MLA, Nujorki Sungoh, in the presence of Additional Chief Secretary, K.N. Kumar, Commissioner and Secretary (Agriculture), P. Sampath Kumar, officers of the horticulture and agriculture departments, and farmers who cultivate turmeric mostly from Jaiñtia Hills region.

Speaking on the occasion, the Governor said Meghalaya climatic condition is conducive for growing a variety of spices, which include prominent ones like turmeric, ginger, chilli, black pepper and bay-leaf.

Jaintia Hills is home to one of the finest turmeric varieties in the world and the most famous one being the Lakadong turmeric with a curcumin content of 7.4 per cent is highly sought after by the market.

“Lakadong turmeric is a rare type of turmeric and has the potential to change the lives of countless farmers if its uniqueness is properly exploited and there is an established demand for the variety and buyers who are willing to pay a premium for its quality,” the Governor said.

The chemical free Lakadong turmeric is much sought after for use in the cosmetic, pharmaceutical and food industry.

However, despite such good demand, farmers have not, till date, been able to realise the full economic potential of this crop because most of them are small and marginal, and due to non availability of planting material and low volumes.

The negative influence of the middle men is another major factor.

There are at least 1000 farmers engaged in the cultivation of Lakadong turmeric in Laskein and Thadlaskein Blocks, and the area is about 2500 hectares.

“I have ascertained that the total production is just about 10,000 MT per year. This kind of volume is not sufficient to create a global foot print for our Lakadong. There is a necessity to undertake a mission mode intervention to increase the production of Lakadong Tumeric to at least 50,000 MT per year and more than double the area,” the Governor said.

The Mission Lakadong was launched to lend exclusive focus on Lakadong turmeric, also known as the “golden spice” and put in place targeted interventions aimed at the improvement of livelihoods of turmeric farmers by leveraging upon its default organic status, capture and meet the demand for this valuable spice from markets and industries especially the pharmaceutical industry.

The main objective of the Mission is to enhance the livelihood and income opportunities of Lakadong turmeric farmers by leveraging on the uniqueness of Lakadong to tap the current and emerging opportunities in the spice sector which will call for setting a target of 50,000 MT of Lakadong in a period of five years.

The Mission will adopt an end to end holistic approach to organic Lakadong cultivation and will put in place interventions to increase that area under from its current status of 6367 acres (2577 hectares) to 15,000 acres (6070 hectares) over the next five years. The Mission will also improve the productivity from 6 MT per hectare to 8 MT per hectare, introduction of latest technologies of plant propagation to increase and improve the availability of planting material, post harvest technology induction including solar dehydrators, product aggregation, creation of a dedicated Hub and Center for Excellence for Lakadong, mobilization of farmers into Farmer Interest Groups, training, capacity building, creation of an ecosystem for promotion of turmeric based agri-businesses and a dedicated supply chain linked to markets for turmeric.