The Chhattisgarh Government has released about 2.17 lakh quintals of wheat for distribution to the priority and ordinary ration card-holders under the Public Distribution System (PDS) for the current month of February. The Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Protection Department said that the food grains is meant for all the 27 districts.
About 1.86 lakh is meant for Priority card-holders and 15,323 quintal is for the ordinary card-holders. The Government under PDS has released 2.48 lakh tonnes of various ration items for month of February. The allotment of ration is for all 27 districts, officials informed . The ration would be available in 10,100 fair price shops in the State and would be distributed among 64 lakh ration card holders.
Moreover, about 19.89 lakh quintals of rice was allocated to ration card holders during the current month under PDS in Chhattisgarh, officials stated. The Government allocated 14.2 lakh quintals of rice to priority families among the ration card holders, 5,51,953 quintals to Antodaya families, 31,186 quintals to general category families, 2,996 quintals to the dependent families and 870 quintals to the differently abled families.
The State Government has begun the preparations for Kharif season 2015. The Agriculture Department had demanded from the Central Government to provide 11.25 lakh metric tonnes of various fertilisers for Kharif season 2015. After getting approval on the departmental proposal, Agriculture Minister Brijmohan Agrawal will send the proposal to the Central Government.
Agriculture Department officials informed that for Kharif season crop, 5.75 lakh metric tonnes of Urea, 2.25 lakh metric tonnes of DAP, 1.55 lakh metric tonnes of NCP, 70,000 metric tonnes MOP and one lakh metric tonnes of NPK have been demanded from Central Government. Officials informed that farmers were supplied 9.48 lakh metric tonnes of fertilisers in Kharif 2014 and 9.40 lakh metric tonnes of fertilisers in Kharif 2013 as per their demands.
Meanwhile, the Chhattisgarh Government is providing free seeds and fertilisers to the tribal families holding forest right certificates in the State, officials stated. The Government had been banking heavily on production and distribution of high quality certified seeds to the farmers for improving quality of crop output in the State, they stated.
A total of 9 lakh quintals of certified seeds were produced and distributed to the farmers during 2014 in Chhattisgarh, officials informed. The aim of the State Government is to increase the production of certified seeds by 31 per cent during the next five years. In order to achieve the target ‘Akthi Beej Samvardhan Yojana’ was launched earlier in 2009-10, to encourage farmers to produce certified seeds, they stated.