The unseasonal rains and snowfall this year have damaged about 80 per cent tomato and pea crop in the mountainous regions of Uttarakhand. The Uttarakhand Agriculture Production Marketing Committee (UAPMC) president Ravindra Singh Anand said this while addressing the media on Friday. He said the wheat production in Udamsingh Nagar, Dehradun and Haridwar districts is bound to decline due to rain and hails this year and farmers are sure to face losses.
The sowing of ginger in the State is delayed by a month by the recent spell of unseasonal rains, Singh added. The chairman of UAPMC informed that to create awareness among the farmers about various Government schemes, UAPMC would organise a three-day agriculture fair in the Mandi campus. The fair would start on April 25 and would be inaugurated by State Chief Minister Harish Rawat.
He informed the issue of large scale damage to the crops by unseasonal rains would be raised before the Chief Minister and a demand would be made for monetary compensation to the rain-hit farmers. “Farmers can directly handover their letters for demand of compensation to Chief Minister during the fair,” he said.
The Chairman of UAPMC said the stalls of horticulture department, milk development board, IFFCO, Seed certification board, aromatic plants department, tea board, meteorology department, pisciculture, cooperative department, rural development department, Pant Nagar University and Punjab National Bank would be setup in the fair for the benefit of farmers.
The agriculturists would be told about welfare schemes like farm produce loss compensation, personal accident and scholarships. The meritorious children of farmers are given a monthly scholarship of Rs1,500 similarly under the farmers are given a monetary support of Rs30,000 to Rs1 lakh in case of any accident.
Singh said farmers would be informed about high yielding seeds and subsidy on farm equipments during the fair. “The State has immense potential for production of flowers but accepted that lacks of marketing facilities are hindering the growth of flower culture in State,” he added.