RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Farm­ers in Co­r­i­al, Princes Town, woke up yes­ter­day morn­ing to see dozens of co­conut trees butchered, nuts scat­tered, crops up­root­ed, and tools stolen, as thieves went on what res­i­dents de­scribed as a night-long ram­page.

Frus­trat­ed with the in­crease of theft, the farm­ers gath­ered un­der a gar­den shed at Sec­ond Co­r­i­al Road, de­mand­ing ur­gent ac­tion from the au­thor­i­ties, in­clud­ing a gat­ed farm­ing zone and more ac­tive pa­trols by the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Squad.

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the scene, farmer Ram­sumair Hanu­man showed heaps of co­conut shells, in­clud­ing young nuts that had been cut off from the trees.

He said yes­ter­day’s theft was the worst they had seen for the year.

“We’re get­ting too many loss­es. Out of 70 farm­ers, about 30 stop farm­ing be­cause of lar­ce­ny,” he said.

An­oth­er farmer, Lenny Hanu­man, whose co­conuts, patchoi, and av­o­ca­do trees were raid­ed, said they were fac­ing not on­ly theft but van­dal­ism too.

“They mash­ing down our equip­ment. They root out the whole pak choi. I plant, and by the time I go back, they gone with it. Even the co­conuts—they drink­ing them on the spot. I went to the po­lice sta­tion, spent three hours mak­ing a re­port, and noth­ing was done.”

Hanu­man said the re­peat­ed loss­es had made it dif­fi­cult to pro­vide for his three chil­dren.

“I can’t give them the ne­ces­si­ties they re­al­ly need. No com­pen­sa­tion, no pro­tec­tion. We need pa­trols, we need some­body in au­thor­i­ty to help us,” he added.

How­ev­er, he said the loss­es go be­yond crops as tools, pumps, hoses and even pow­er saws have been stolen in re­cent months.

Farmer Ram­sumair Hanu­man, who has been farm­ing for the past 50 years, said the sit­u­a­tion had reached break­ing point with some farm­ers now threat­en­ing to take mat­ters in­to their own hands.

“This is a ter­ri­ble sit­u­a­tion. Farm­ers spend a whole life­time here and now no pro­duc­tion at all. We wait­ing hours for po­lice to come for three hours now, but they nev­er show. Over 100 acres of land here, and still more farm­ers are giv­ing up be­cause the loss­es too much,” he said.

Farmer Shel­don Drakes said his lime trees were al­so raid­ed.

“All my lime trees gone. They pass­ing through the gar­den, mess­ing up the chem­i­cals, dam­ag­ing equip­ment. I lost about $20,000 in sweet pota­toes,” he added.

He added that some of the thieves have dam­aged equip­ment.

“Near­ly 40 farm­ers have al­ready giv­en up be­cause we re­ly on pumps and gen­er­a­tors, and thieves just dam­age every­thing. We can’t take the law in our own hands, or we end up in hand­cuffs. So what must we do?” he asked.

Drakes said they have re­peat­ed­ly called 999 for help, of­ten wait­ing hours with­out a re­sponse.

He warned that if the sit­u­a­tion con­tin­ues, con­sumers may un­know­ing­ly buy stolen pro­duce, some of which could be un­safe.

“Peo­ple are say­ing they will put poi­son for the thieves, but if they do this, in­no­cent peo­ple will get hurt. These peo­ple are steal­ing the pro­duce, dam­ag­ing our beds, and at this point, every­body is just frus­trat­ed to see their labour go down the drain,” he said.

Last year, sev­er­al gar­den sheds were set on fire af­ter farm­ers called for in­creased pa­trols. A source at the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Unit said pa­trols were done in the area.

The farm­ers are seek­ing a meet­ing with Agri­cul­ture Min­is­ter Ravi Rati­ram.

Guardian Me­dia reached out to Rati­ram for a com­ment and was await­ing a re­sponse up to late yes­ter­day.