oodies
हिंदी खबरें 
The Minister of Agriculture, Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Shri Sharad Pawar has urged upon the States to enlist the support of the all concerned departments to improve the quality and quantity of the essential services planned for the farmers.
Inaugurating the National Agriculture Conference for Kharif Campaign here today Shri Pawar said that in view of increase in the budget of the Agriculture Department every year, it is incumbent upon all of us to take steps to ensure that these funds are spent judiciously and in time so that the desired benefits reach the farmers.
The Minister asked the states to ensure responsive administration in ensuring timely delivery of inputs to the farmers. He said, this is important, not only from the point of view of increasing production, productivity and farm incomes but also from the point of view of increasing supply of essential food commodities to meet the food security and nutritional demands of our country at affordable prices.
Shri Pawar said, ‘the Government has decided to follow a four pronged strategy to spur growth in the agriculture sector. The main elements of this strategy cover agricultural production, reduction in wastage of produce, credit support to farmers and thrust to the food processing sector.
Several initiatives have been announced in the budget for 2010-11 to launch this strategy for broad basing the agriculture development in the country. We have decided to target the immense potential of the Eastern Region by allocating an additional Rs. 400 crores under Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana.
This would ensure that the key impediments to agriculture development in the region are attended to holistically for the sustained development of agriculture. We would like the States in Eastern Region namely West Bengal, Bihar, Orissa, Jharkhand, Eastern Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh to be actively associated with us for drawing up a comprehensive plan that could be implemented from the Rabi season this year’.
The Minister said, ‘despite our best efforts there has not been significant improvement in the productivity and production of pulses in the country. We have decided to accord highest attention to pulses crops by merging the Pulses component of ISOPOM with National Food Security Mission. We have decided to launch an Accelerated Pulses Production Programme under the Mission entailing block demonstrations of technology over 1 million hectares of five major pulses crops – moong, arhar, urad, chana and masoor.
With this initiative, the allocation under the Pulses component of the Mission would be doubled and would be used to cover all the districts of the selected States. I am also very pleased to announce the inclusion of Jharkhand and Assam in the Mission for pulses from the coming financial year’.
Referring to investment of an additional amount of Rs. 300 crores under Rashtriy Krishi Vikas Yojna in 60,000 pulses and oilseeds villages in the rainfed areas of the country, the Minister said, this amount is small and should be used in a pragmatic manner. He asked the States to utilize these funds imaginatively in conjunction with the State plans and with other ongoing schemes like NFSM, ISOPOM, NWDPRA, NREGA etc to create impact.
Addressing the Conference, the Minister of State for Agriculture, Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Prof. K. V. Thomas said, the demand for food is growing rapidly due to increasing population and rising income levels and we need to produce about 320 million tonnes of food grains by 2025.
He said, ‘ this challenge would require combination of seed-fertilizer-irrigation-technologies. Soil test based judicious application of fertilizers would help improvement in productivity, lower input costs, environmental health and efficient utilization of subsidy. The State Governments should accelerate setting up of soil testing laboratories and issue of soil health cards to farmers.
The Government has introduced Nutrient Based Subsidy policy from 1st April, 2010. The Central Government will make available fertilizers in required quantities. The state Governments have to ensure efficient utilization of fertilizers. Malpractices must be curbed for better effectiveness’.
Vice Chancellors of the State Agriculture Universities, Agriculture Production Commissioners, State Principal Secretaries of Agriculture and officers from the Central and the State Governments are participating in the two-day conference.
