By OUR STAFF REPORTER
Nainital, 13 Jan: Coarse grains grown in the mountainous areas of Nainital district are now going to get a better market. Mountain products will now not only gain recognition across the country as nutritious food, but will also be able to get a better market by being purchased at government designated Minimum Support Price.
For this purpose, a one-day workshop was organised under the chairmanship of District Magistrate Dhiraj Singh Garbyal to promote the International Millet Year 2023 and the cultivation and consumption of nutritious grains at Shiksha Bhawan, Bhimtal.
Inaugurating the workshop, the District Magistrate said that 2023 has been declared as the International Millet Year. Wide publicity will be spread to promote coarse grains (Koda, Jhangora, Ramdana, etc.) in the country. For this, the district level was held today. He said that, for the first time in 22 years, arrangements are being made by the Uttarakhand Government to purchase Mandua from among coarse grains cultivated by hill farmers at minimum support price. The plan is still in its initial stage. From the coming year, it will be implemented in a better way, as fair prices would add value to the products.
The District Magistrate added that Indian coarse grains have traditionally been in great demand in the country and abroad. The effort would be to export coarse grains to foreign countries, so that farmers can get a better price for their produce. Coarse grains are also considered good for the consumer, the producer and the climate. Apart from being nutritious, they can also be grown with use of less water.
Chief Development Officer Dr Sandeep Tiwari spoke about providing improved varieties of seeds and departmental technical cooperation to the farmers to increase the production capacity of coarse grains. He said that, at present, all efforts are being made at the district level to identify coarse grains of Uttarakhand and get better prices.
On this occasion, the farmers were provided technical knowledge by the scientists of Krishi Vigyan Kendra. Present on this occasion were Chief Agriculture Officer Dr VK Yadav, KVK scientist Dr Kanchan Nainwal, Dr Deepali Tiwari, Dr Balwan Singh, Dr Vijay Kumar, Dr Dinesh Joshi, District Education Officer Gopal Bhardwaj, Agriculture and Soil Conservation Officer Bhimtal Ritu Kukreti, General Manager, Industries, Sunil Kumar Pant, District Probation Officer Vyoma Jain, District Programme Officer Gaurav Pant and a number of progressive farmers.
