YS Jagan Mohan Reddy pitches for raising income of horticulture farmers

Amaravati: Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy directed the officials to chalk out strategies to increase the income of farmers in the horticulture sector by partnering with skilled institutions and universities across the world to impart knowledge to them on latest technologies.

During a review on horticulture at his camp office on Friday, the Chief Minister said that continuous research and study are needed for developing new varieties for cultivation and there was a need to adopt latest technology in the field of food processing. He also said that discarding tomatoes on the roadside, leaving onion crop in the fields due to lack of remunerative prices should be resolved. He directed the authorities to encourage farmers towards cultivating high yielding crops, focussing on onion cultivation in Kurnool district which has a good market potential and stressed on cultivating crops that are suitable for food processing.

Further, the Chief Minister stressed on cultivating coconut, banana, papaya, chilli, tomato, onion and sweet potato crops and told the authorities to focus on establishing food processing units in 25 parliamentary constituencies across the state.

The officials informed that the state tops in coconut, papaya and tomato cultivation and productivity and added that they have taken up banana cultivation in the tissue culture process. In regard to food processing units, the officials said construction works would begin in a phased manner from October.

The Chief Minister said that more attention should be paid towards chilli processing, with the cooperation of international organisations. Similarly, he also directed the authorities to ensure a better price is being paid to the farmers for coconut cultivation. In this regard, he directed the vice-chancellor of the University of Horticulture to conduct continuous research on coconut cultivation with the help of reputed organisations, focussing on the problems encountered.

In addition, the Chief Minister suggested having a grievance cell at RBKs to clear doubts expressed by the farmers and said that agriculture assistants must address those concerns. He directed the authorities to monitor the grievances received, how they were addressed, while inspecting the RBKs. He said that agriculture students must work for at least one month in RBKs, as it will give them an understanding of their performance and programmes.

The Chief Minister instructed the officials to maintain transparency in granting of drip irrigation equipment, where the selection of beneficiaries should be done by RBKs. He suggested going for reverse tendering for the procurement of the equipment, as the rates would be significantly reduced and stressed on providing quality equipment to the farmers at better rates.