The Van Panchayats have been given the responsibility of redressing shortage of cattle fodder.
The Animal Husbandry department will continue to implement its 11 cattle fodder development related schemes as before. Fund will be provided to the department under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana for fodder storage. The Forest Department will facilitate fodder plantation on 20,000 hectares through 12,000 Van Panchayats in the State. These decisions were taken in a meeting chaired by chief secretary Subhash Kumar at the secretariat on Monday.
The CS directed officials of the Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Forest Department and Watershed Management to make coordinated efforts to develop fodder banks.Fodder development units have been established in Kalsi, Shyampur and Rudrapur by the Animal Husbandry Department. The department’s 101 fodder banks have a total deposit of 18000 metric tonnes of fodder, despite which there is still a one lakh metric tonnes shortage of fodder in the state.
The Forest department was directed to conduct a campaign to overcome this shortage. The department was also asked to grow fruit and fodder species to prevent wild animals from looking for food near human settlements.