Karnataka - Belgaum   

Yeddyurappa for debate on farm policy

Belgaum: Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa has expressed apprehensions over the consequences of failure of rainfall in the State on the agriculture sector.

He said there was no rainfall in several parts of the State since about a month. The situation would turn grave if this continued for a few more days, he said. “The Government and farmers may have to confront a fresh tragedy if there was no rainfall within a fortnight,” Mr. Yeddyurappa said and added that the Government would do everything possible to protect farmers in such an eventuality.

Mr. Yeddyurappa was interacting with farmers here on Saturday.

The Chief Minister said the pre-budget interaction with farmers being held across the State would help him find solutions to major problems confronting the growers. He said that no chief minister had taken up such an exercise before presenting the budget.

Mr. Yeddyurappa called for a fresh nationwide debate on agricultural policy in view of the deepening crises that were forcing growers to commit suicide. He observed that no serious thinking had gone into framing the present agricultural policies of the Centre and the State. Despite spending large sums of money on construction of dams and reservoirs, water was not reaching tail-end users, silt formation in water tanks and depleting water table continued to be major problems, he said.

Asked whether he was hinting at framing a new agricultural policy for the State, the Chief Minster said he was only trying to give a new direction to the agricultural policy and responding to the burning problems of farmers so that he could provide succour to them in the budget which would be presented on July 17.

He said the BJP Government would accord priority to implementing the promises made in its manifesto and those made by him as the Deputy Chief Minister in the previous coalition Government.

Mr. Yeddyurappa said his immediate concern was to stop farmers’ suicide and prevent migration of people from rural areas to urban centres.

Stating that about 50 per cent of the subsidies provided by the Union and State governments were not reaching farmers, he said the Government would consider providing subsidies directly to them.

The Chief Minister, who released a poster on the theme “Organic farming is the need of the hour” on the occasion, called upon farmers to adopt organic farming to become self-reliant.

“It is time to return to our time-tested age-old agricultural practice which is now known as organic farming,” Mr. Yeddyurappa said.

He also advised farmers to take up mixed cropping.

Suggestions made by farmers included framing a scientific pricing policy for agricultural produce taking into account the cost of production and conducting training programmes for farmers on production of seeds indigenously.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Yeddyurappa for debate on farm policy
Government to look for alternative site for Suvarna Vidhana Soudha
Belgaum to be made model city: Yeddyurappa

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu