Crop specific agri clusters to be developed in JK
Jammu: The Jammu and Kashmir administration on Wednesday announced development of crop specific agriculture clusters to provide ancillary support to farmers and ensure proper road connectivity to various markets, an official spokesman said.
The annual plan for financial year 2020-21, amounting to Rs 16.53 crore, already stands approved for the success of clusters, an official spokesman said.
He said Chief Secretary B V R Subrahmanyam chaired a meeting of State Food Security Mission Executive Committee to review the achievements under the National Food Security Mission (NFSM) with special focus on progress made in the field of Oil Seeds (OS) and Tree Borne Oil Seeds (TBO).
Highlighting the importance of the Mission in doubling farmer’s income, the chief secretary emphasised on increasing production of food grains and oils through area expansion and productivity enhancement in a sustainable manner.
He asked the officers to adopt ‘cluster approach’ for assessing the climatic suitability for a crop, developing the required infrastructure, providing necessary ancillary support to farmers, and ensuring proper road connectivity to various markets, the spokesman said.
“These clusters can further be developed into small areas of excellence for a particular crop,” he added.
In a separate meeting, the spokesman said the chief secretary approved the proposals for undertaking cluster demonstrations, introducing pest tolerant and bio-fortified varieties of crops, ensuring soil protection management and post harvest management, besides, providing cropping system based training to the stakeholders.
Later, the State Level Sanctioning Committee of Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana, under the guidance of chief secretary, approved the annual action plan for financial year 2020-21 amounting to Rs 75.80 crore, the spokesman said.
He said major activities of agriculture and allied departments for 2020-21 will include mitigation of effects of COVID-19 outbreak on the sectors, production streams and marketing infrastructure.
