By Our Staff Reporter
Dehradun, 1 Dec: Cooperatives Minister Dr Dhan Singh Rawat and Animal Husbandry Minister Saurabh Bahuguna jointly launched the Poultry Valley Scheme at UKCDP Directorate, Rajpur Road, here, today.
Dr Rawat said on the occasion that the project of his department has doubled the income of the farmers of Uttarakhand over the last 3 years. For this, under the Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Sahakari Kisan Kalyan Yojana, six and a half lakh people have been given loans at 0% interest. It is the right time to double the income of poultry farmers. Dr Rawat said that, in Uttarakhand, chickens come from Najibabad and Bijnor. The project has tried to provide assistance to poultry farmers at the local level so that their income is doubled and stops migration from hill areas.
Dhan Singh Rawat said that Poultry Valley will be established through the cluster approach. Villages or areas with high potential will be identified so that a cluster approach can be achieved to help support economies of scale and convergence of resources for supply/procurement of inputs and marketing of products. Dr Rawat said that it will also promote entrepreneurship and learning by sharing community best practices.
Animal Husbandry Minister Sourabh Bahuguna said that, with the implementation of this scheme, employment opportunities will be created for the youth and women will also be successful in becoming more empowered. He said that migration will stop and employment will increase. Minister Bahuguna expressed happiness that cooperatives and animal husbandry departments are working together to double the income of farmers. He said it is easy to implement schemes on the ground, but the officers should work with the aim of making them successful efficiently.
Dr BVRC Purushottam, Secretary, Cooperative and Animal Husbandry Department, said that a target of 5000 beneficiaries has been set for this scheme for the project period from financial year 2022 to 2025. A provision of Rs 10,363 lakh has been made for the total project cost, including grant-in-aid of Rs 900 lakh by the Animal Husbandry Department, interest-free loan assistance of Rs 7963 lakh by the Cooperatives Department, Rs 1500 lakh from the State Integrated Cooperative Development Project. Dr Purushottam told that this work is being done on such a large scale for the first time in the state with the joint efforts of two departments.
On this occasion, Anand Shukla, the nodal officer of the scheme on State Integrated Cooperative Development, told the outline of the entire Poultry Valley scheme. Many officers including Director Animal Husbandry Dr Prem Kumar, Nodal Officer Anand Shukla, Project Director Dr Avinash Anand, Project Director Jaideep Arora, Alpana Haldia and Manager Manoj Rawat were present on this occasion.
