The Department of Agriculture Jammu organized a one day training programme for farmers of Ramban, Udhampur and Jammu districts under Sub-Mission on Agriculture Extension (SMAE-ATMA) which was inaugurated by Director Agriculture, Ashok Kumar Malhotra.Speaking on the occasion, Malhotra advised the farmers to learn latest technical and scientific aspects of apiculture, Vegetable and mushroom cultivation and adopt the same to increase their farm income. He asked them to make use of every opportunity to get information with regard to different farmers welfare schemes and incentives and come forward to fulfill the mission of the government to double the farmer’s income by 2022. He further asked the farmers to diversify their farming through adoption of income generating ventures like apiculture, mushroom cultivation, vegetable growing especially under Protected Cultivation and vermi-compost making for which department is providing guidance, training and various incentives.
Dr. Sachin Gupta, Associate Professor (Plant Pathology), Dr. Uma Shankar, Assistant Professor (Entomology) from SKUAST-J and other Resource Persons from the department delivered lectures on round the year cultivation of mushroom, value addition in mushroom & vegetables, apiculture and Plant Protection Measures for various agricultural crops and seed production.The farmers were also taken for an exposure visit to the Naturally Ventilated Poly Green House structure where protected cultivation of vegetables being done by the department was shown to them to motivate them in this venture. Earlier, Bulesh Zutshi, Deputy Director of Agriculture (Trainings) briefed the participants about the awareness generation and skill development schemes of the department.The programme was followed by farmers-scientists interaction in different districts of Jammu Division.H. K. Razdan, Joint Director of Agriculture (Extension), C. M. Sharma, Deputy Director of Agriculture (Central) and Arun Gupta and Farm Management Specialist were also present on the occasion.