panaji with paddy cultivation season in full swing right in the middle of the pandemic lockdown and migrant workers headed back to their home states in large numbers it seemed like farmers primarily dependent on the migrant labour force would face a hitfrom employing local labour to harnessing technology such as renting sowing machines and transplanters farmers have adopted various measures to ensure that their fields didnt remain uncultivated in the face of the pandemicfor carmonabased farmer blair rodrigues the lockdown served as an eyeopener he managed to carry out tasks such as weeding ploughing transplanting and even spraying of organic manure by using technology something he had otherwise turned a blind eye to i have mechanised the cultivation process and managed the tasks for the past month by renting machines he saidrodrigues is now preparing to rent harvester machines to harvest his paddy crop in october further he plans to replicate this model and share it with other farmers during the rabi seasonto counter the shortage of the migrant workforce community farmer nestor rangel hired people locally to work at his farm in valpoi many of these workers would be employed in the cashew farms in sattari which keeps them busy annually from december to may from june to november they are usually free since theyre already well trained in tasks like manuring manicuring etc i have managed to tend to my farm with their help he saidhowever the hiring of local labour comes at a 3040 higher cost while farmers paid migrant workers rs 400 per day for fieldwork they are now shelling out anywhere between rs 600 to 700 per day for the local labourers farmers have had to manage because some farm activities must be timed sowing of seeds must be done at a certain time and spraying of fertilizer must be done after a given period such tasks cannot wait until labour is available at ones preferred cost said rohan joshi who has a farm in bicholimanother farmer vinod barve went to the extent of ensuring that his migrant labour receives amenities in goa itself thus eliminating the need for them to return to their hometown originally from jharkhand i have 14 workers at my farm in valpoi during the lockdown i paid them salaries and provided them with groceries as a result i didnt face any problems during the cashew harvest season nor am i inconvenienced now he saidsatish tendulkar a retired agriculture official and coconut farmer said that migrant workers are currently required for manuring of crops at horticulture gardens and applying fungicide to arecanut crops not only workers from far off jharkhand and bihar even those from neighbouring karnataka and maharashtra have not yet returned paddy cultivators managed by getting their family to help in the fields using machines but farmland owners who were completely dependent on migrant workers have faced a setback he said