Principal Secretary, Agriculture Production and Horticulture, Navin Kumar Choudhary, today convened a meeting to review the physical and financial achievements of Agriculture and Horticulture departments.Director, Agriculture Jammu, Inder Jeet, Director Horticulture Jammu Ram Sevak, Director Command Area Development, Smita Sethi besides senior officers of Agriculture and Horticulture departments were present in the meeting.Director Agriculture and Director Horticulture briefed the Principal Secretary about the present status of various schemes and projects being executed by their respective departments besides highlighting physical and financial achievements registered so far.Briefing about the achievements of Agriculture Department, Director apprised that wheat crop has been harvested on an area of 2.30 Lakh hectare by pressing into service more than 300 harvesters cum binders. He informed that 12032 samples of soil have been collected, of which, 7188 were analyzed and 3902 Soil Health Cards have been distributed among the farmers. Besides, 19041 quintals of HYV seeds including paddy, maize, pulses and fodder have been distributed among more than one lakh eighty four thousand farmers.Director informed that 407 thousand hectare area has been sown against the target area of 392 thousand hectare for the Kharif crops. He said that 5.22 lakh families have been registered under PM-Kissan scheme, of which, 5.03 lakh have been linked with KCC scheme.
He added that 20 seasonal mandis have been established in the catchment areas of Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts.While briefing about the achievement of Horticulture Department, Director informed that about 1.18 lakh hectare area is under fruit crop and Walnut, Mango, Apple, Pear and Lemon are major fruit crops here and 83% of total revenue comes out of these crops. He briefed about the procedure for area expansion, promotion of Backyard Horticulture in urban and rural areas, organic farming, creation and strengthening of irrigation infrastructure, post harvest management, development of horticulture assets etc.After taking a comprehensive review, Navin Kumar stressed for exploring new and scientific farming techniques for value addition of agricultural products adding that this will help to improve the condition of farmers by getting fair and better remunerative price for their produce.He told the Directors to identify small chunk of lands along the National Highway for establishing farmers’ markets so that more and more marketing avenues are created. He asked for collection of data by conducting a survey of land under cultivation, crops and its productivity on scientific basis. He also emphasized upon to make a strategy for marketing of fruits and other agriculture products and put in more efforts for its value addition. He asked the officers to lay focus on organic farming and Aloe-vera plantation. He also stressed upon the both the Directors to expedite the process for getting the funds released under the Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSSs) by the Government of India.