Principal Secretary Animal and Sheep Husbandry & Fisheries departments, Navin Kumar Choudhary today directed the officers to renovate and upgrade at least one Liquified Nitrogen Gas (LNG) plant in both the divisions of the J&K to enhance local production here. These directions were given by him in the 32ndState Implementation Agency (SIA) meeting of the Livestock Board of Jammu and Kashmir.The meeting was attended by Directors of Animal Husbandry of both the divisions, Dean Faculty of Veterinary Sciences, SKUAST Kashmir and Jammu, CEOs of Livestock Development Boards of both the divisions and many other officers of the department. Jammu based officers participated in the meeting through video conferencing.The Principal Secretary asked the officers to at least reserve 10% LNG at each station for meeting out any eventuality. He also directed for constitution of a committee with members from the Agricultural Universities to study the demand and production of LNG here besides the scope of the possibility of renovation of old LNG plants here.Navin further asked the officers to look for the possibility of introduction of ‘sexed semen' for insemination so that people do not have to go to far off places for the same. He instructed that the service should be made available by the department on cost to cost basis only. He urged them to make the Pashudhan Melas a regular feature in which both buyers and sellers are aided in doing the business by the department.
The Principal Secretary asked the SKUAST administration to reorient their research programmes in consonance with the requirements of the department so that a firm policy is made on the authentic data provided by these universities. He asked the HODs to provide research requirements of the department at the onset of the academic year to the Agricultural Universities so that the relevant data is received at an appropriate time. He advised them to conduct joint meetings regularly for ironing out the issues and meeting each others demands.The meeting decided to carryout research projects to determine the success of new cow varieties introduced here.It was also said that the viability and economic position of big dairy farms established during the past 5 years should also be studied for the better planning and policy making for future.The universities were also asked to introduce the short term certificate courses of the duration of 5-6 weeks on the analogy of different national institutions to provide specialization to the seekers. They were encouraged to send the students for field surveys during vacations besides introducing mandatory field training for the completion of the course.The meeting was informed that artificial insemination helps in increasing the milk production vertically and department is performing the same without charging the farmers. It was given out that more than 8.5 lakh artificial inseminations(AIs) have been done in the previous year and this year an aspirational target of 13 lakh AIs has been set for the department.The meeting was apprised that there are several CSS in progress here which would help department to achieve the target. These include Rashtriya Gokul Mission (RGM), Nation wide AI Program (NAIP), Krishi Kalyan Abhiyan (KKA), and National Mission on Bovine Productivity (NMBP). All of the schemes focus on upgrading and strengthening the bovine breeding infrastructure here and bring services to the doorsteps of farmers free of cost, as was informed in the meeting.