View from the top: A training session for women at Malappuram

When K.K. Sheeba first scaled a coconut tree in her backyard, she was barely into her teens. “I just wanted to climb trees like my father and other relatives — and look at my village from the height of a coconut tree,” she says.

What was fun more than a decade ago is now a survival skill for Sheeba, an arts graduate and a certified coconut plucker in Kerala’s Kozhikode district. She is the only woman in a group of 40 would-be coconut pluckers that the Kozhikode collectorate recently trained in a programme called the Swabhiman scheme, which was inaugurated on January 1.

“Being the only woman wasn’t a problem at all. I wanted to enhance my coconut plucking skills. Now I know that I can earn a decent amount of money,” says Sheeba, whose husband is a casual worker in Kozhikode.

God’s own country is in dire need of coconut pluckers. Those who were traditionally in the trade have branched off into other areas. So people like Sheeba are greatly sought after in the state where coconuts are a part of almost everybody’s diet.

“We used to have at least two or three families in a village whose only job was to pluck coconuts. These days, it’s hard to find even one such family in a whole panchayat,” says C.T. Varghese, a coconut farmer in Veluppaamkulam in Kozhikode, which is the largest coconut-producing district in Kerala. And this despite the fact that coconut picking pays — a person can earn Rs 12-20 plucking coconuts from a tree. On an average, a person can climb 45-60 trees and earn Rs 540-1,200 a day.

Kerala has the largest area under coconut trees in India, with about 8.20 lakh hectares producing more than 5600 million nuts a year. But the largest coconut producer in the country now has trouble harvesting the fruit because of the acute shortage of coconut pluckers. Not surprisingly, coconut production is on the decline.

“We Keralites don’t like to get our white clothes dirty with manual labour, at least not within our state and not unless it’s a government job,” says Varghese. In a bid to attract people, the Kozhikode collectorate tried to give coconut plucking the “respectability” of a government job.

State administrators say it is not just coconut plucking that’s an endangered profession. Kerala faces an acute shortage of skilled manpower in plumbing, repair of home appliances and other such activities.

“I came to the conclusion that one of the main ways of attracting youngsters to take up these professions was by training and employing them through a government agency,” says Dr P.B. Salim, district collector, Kozhikode. Salim, an Indian Administrative Service officer of the West Bengal cadre, is currently on deputation to the state.

When the collectorate called for applications for training and employment in as diverse trades as electrical repairs, plumbing, carpentry and coconut plucking, there was a flood of applications. “We got around 350 applications — mostly for coconut plucking. We had graduates, diploma holders and even Gulf returnees, all wanting to be certified as coconut pluckers. We finally trained 40 people,” says Salim.

Assisted by the state agricultural department, the collectorate trained the group in climbing trees with the aid of a scaling device manufactured by local company Raidco. Members of the trained group will now be stationed at a building near the Kozhikode collectorate, just a phone call away from anywhere in the district. Each caller will be charged a minimum of Rs 100 for the service.

Consumers can also text a message or send a request through the website www.swabhiman.gov.in.

“We now have a dedicated phone line. These people will be given identity cards and climbing devices for free. And they can have their own two wheelers,” says Salim.

“I know that it’s not a government job. But since it is the sponsor, and we will have the I-cards signed by the collector, it gives us a sense of security,” says P. Sreejith, one of the trainees who took up the trade despite stiff opposition from his parents. “They think that I would bring a bad name to the family by doing such a lowly job. I hope their views will change once I start earning money,” he says.

“It was a masterstroke by the Kozhikode collectorate. These people now feel a certain pride with an ID card hanging around their necks,” exults Mohammad B.M., deputy director, Kerala agricultural department, who co-ordinated the training programme.

The Coconut Development Board (CDB), under the central ministry of agriculture, which has been trying to encourage coconut pluckers by offering them training and a life-term insurance cover, hopes that the steps by the Kozhikode administration will prompt other districts to take up such programmes.

“We are doing our best to encourage more people to become coconut pluckers. This will give a further fillip to our efforts,” says M. Thomas Mathew, chief coconut development officer, CDB.

But this alone is unlikely to solve the problem for Kerala. “Coconut prices have fallen to such levels that a farmer cannot even give Rs 10 per tree to a coconut plucker. Many farmers wait for the nuts to ripen and fall from the trees,” says M. Chandran, who is the convenor of a cluster of coconut farmers in Kasargod district.

A coconut today sells for Rs 2-3 as opposed to Rs 6 a few years ago. A kilo of coconut kernel — made out of at least three good quality coconuts — costs Rs 8-10, down from Rs 20 three years ago.

According to Chandran, many farmers in Kasargod district have already started clearing their coconut groves and planting rubber trees in their place. “Many have even started planting black pepper vines, which wind around the coconut trees,” he says.

Kerala’s annual coconut production has been on the decline both in terms of the area of cultivation and production. For instance coconuts grew on 8.99 lakh hectares of land in 2005-2006 but on 8.70 lakh hectares in 2006-2007. The production fell from 6,326 million nuts in 2005-06 to 6,054 million nuts in 2006-2007.

But Mathew of CDB says that coconut pluckers will always be in demand in the state. “There is a fall in the production, but the shortage of pluckers is so acute that they will always be in demand,” he says. For people like Sheeba and Sreejith that’s great news — and they are ready to scale new heights.