The State government has decided to discourage cultivation of maize for the second successive agricultural season in a row keeping in view the prevailing adverse marketing conditions for the crop with huge stock of the crop lying at national and international level.
Minister for Agriculture Singireddy Niranjan Reddy held a video conference with the all district agriculture officers (DAOs) and other senior officers of the Agriculture Department and discussed about alternative crops to maize that could be cultivated during the Yasangi (Rabi) season. It was decided at the virtual meeting to identify crops that have demand in the market could be cultivated instead of maize and take the matter to the Chief Minister’s notice for taking a final decision.
Thanking the farming community in the State for following the regulated farming practice during the Vanakalam (Kharif) season, the Minister said the government had decided to allow cultivation of maize during Yasangi at the beginning of this year’s agricultural season but the national and international conditions had forced the government to change its view since the chances of farmers not getting the support price and suffering huge losses was very high.
The Minister told the agriculture officers and agriculture extension officers to educate the farming community about the impending chances of suffering huge losses with maize cultivation. He directed the officials to identify the areas suitable for cultivation of greengram, blackgram, bengalgram, sunflower, mustard, sesamum and other crops, which have demand in the market and have support price, this season so that they could be encouraged.
Noting that COVID-19 pandemic had forced many sections of people who were living in the urban areas to return to rural areas, the Minister said such reverse migration was expected to increase the extent of Yasangi cultivation this year and could be around 72 lakh acres. He asked the officials to keep the seed of crops being planned available to the farming community.
On fertilizers, the Minister said the Centre had allotted 18.3 lakh tonnes, including 10 lakh tonnes of urea, for the Yasangi season and directed the officials to take all precautions for proper and complaint-free supply of urea and other fertilizers keeping in mind the experiences during the Vanakalam season. He also instructed the officials to speed up construction of rythu vedika buildings and complete them by Dasara.
