Weedicides fail to reach farmers on time

Jalandhar, August 27

In what could be termed as a dilly-dallying approach of the Punjab Agriculture Department towards the crop diversification programme, subsidised weedicides have been made available for farmers after around a month.

Due to the delayed arrival of the subsidised weedicides, maize farmers in the Doaba region could not get the benefit of subsidy as they had to buy it from market. The farmers have to be provided with 50 per cent of the subsidy of the actual price.

Sources in the Agriculture Department said during the maize-sowing period, the subsidised seeds of maize were also arrived late by 20 days, which could not reached the farmers on time and again they had to bought the same from market.

The department set a target to distribute 200 tonnes of maize seeds to the farmers at subsidised rates. However, due to late arrival, only 85 tonnes of seeds could reached the farmers. — TNS