Union Surface Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari declared that vehicles including cars, buses and motorcycles would start using Ethanol as fuel from next Republic Day giving a big respite to the government.
“Now motor vehicles including cars and buses will start using Ethanol as fuel like used in Brazil. The transformation will start from January 26 next year”, Union Surface Transport Minister said.
He said that automobile companies like Honda and Yamaha have made such motorcycles which would run on Ethanol as they run on petrol. “The fruit of this mechanical transformation would be directly reaped by the cane farmers and sugar mills who produce ethanol,” Gadkari said.
The Union Minister said that an ethanol pumps will also be set up like that of petrol pump from the next republic day. Process has started to give licences to people. “We are committed to improve the lot of farmers in UP and therefore steps are being taken to improve sugarcane industry here,” he said.
The Indian Sugar Mills Association in a release has commended Union Government for its decision of 10 per cent ethanol blending with petrol. The statement said that this decision will increase the demand for fuel ethanol to 266 crore litres.
The ISMA claims that this decision will help the government to save almost Rs.5000 crore of foreign exchange. “We expect to get more orders for ethanol supplies, in the next couple of months,” the release said.
While talking the media persons in Muzaffarnagar on Sunday Gadkari said that western Uttar Pradesh was the biggest producer of cane still the production of cane area wise is very less than that of Maharashtra. He advised farmers to keep a distance of 8 centimeters instead of 6 centimeters between two canes.
“The farmers should sow vegetable or some other crop s in the gap. This will give a double income to the farmer,” the minister said.
Also present on the occasion, Union Minister of State for Agriculture Sanjeev Baliyan informed Gadkari that the proposed flyover on the Delhi-Haridwar national highway could not be completed because of a mosque coming. “The state government is not eager to remove that,” he said.
