To promote sugarcane, give subsidy on sowing machines: Rana

Haryana Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Minister Shyam Singh Rana, offering suggestions in the Union pre-Budget meeting, said to increase the production of sugarcane crop, sowing and harvesting machines should be made available to farmers on subsidy so that the crop could be grown, instead of paddy. This would also help save water, he said.

Rana said this via videoconferencing in the suggestion meeting on agriculture and horticulture chaired by Union Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan with agriculture ministers of all states.

He said to promote horticulture, small clusters of 40 to 50 hectares needed to be created. At the same time, a scheme should be made for fencing orchards of horticultural farmers, adding that grants should be given so that the orchards were not damaged. Mandis should be set up for natural farming crops, along with crop testing labs.

He said Haryana had been a pioneer in the Green Revolution and would also be a pioneer in natural farming, which was the current demand of the agriculture sector. Thanking the Union minister for approving the National Mission on Natural Farming, he said it would prove to be a milestone in improving the quality of food items. He said at present, there was a lack of specification and standardisation in the natural farming sector. He requested the Union minister to direct the Central agricultural institutes to work on whether natural farming was to be certified on the basis of quality of produce or farming process or both.

He also drew attention towards the pollution caused by the burning of crop residue. The state had made tremendous progress in controlling farm fires.

This year, there had been a further reduction of 40 per cent and farm fires in Haryana were limited to less than 700, Rana said, adding that the Bhavantar Bharpai Yojana had been implemented in horticultural crops in Haryana since 2018. Twenty-one crops had been included under the scheme. When the prices of crops in the market were less than the cost, the difference between the cost price and crop sale was compensated to farmers by the government. The scheme was giving good results, he claimed.

He said such a scheme should be implemented at the national level and the state should be provided the necessary budget for it.