Additional Chief Secretary, Agriculture Production & Farmers Welfare Department, Atal Dulloo today held a meeting to deliberate upon different aspects of promotion of wool based industry here in J&K.The meeting was attended by Additional Chief Secretary, Finance, Vivek Bharadwaj; Director, Sheep Husbandry, Jammu/Kashmir; Director I&C, Jammu/Kashmir; Director Handicrafts & Handloom, Jammu/Kashmir; MD JK Industries and many other officers from the concerned Departments.
Jammu based officers participated in the meeting through video conferencing.Dulloo stressed upon the officers to devise a viable framework for making wool industry a success in the UT. He emphasised on the fact that wool is the only raw material that is available in abundance here and can support a large industrial setup.
He maintained that such an industry has a potential to provide employment to thousands of our youth thereby tiding over the problem of unemployment here. He asked the officers to look into all the aspects of reviving this industry here including the one on PPP mode. He observed that a well-thought plan has all the chances of being successful once implemented efficiently.
The ACS, Agriculture observed that it is the only natural fiber in which the nation is deficient. He gave out that proper processing, grading, marketing, and value addition will turn around fortunes for farmers dealing with it. He enjoined upon them to put all the relevant infrastructure to optimal use so that the wool farming becomes remunerative.
The ACS, Industries & Commerce reiterated that the promotion of the trade is government’s priority. He remarked that the New Industrial Policy has all the attributes for promoting trade and business across J&K.He noted that any proposal for reviving this industry would be supported unequivocally.
He gave out that J&K has enough resources to support any such initiatives. He further asked them that they might look into the possibility of finding the relevant Central Schemes for supporting this initiative.It was revealed in the meeting that the domestic produce of wool in the country is not adequate and the industry is dependent on imports. The wool import to nation stands at 77 million Kgs per year.
It was further revealed that J&K produces 7 million Kg of wool annually against the country’s production of 40 million Kgs thereby accounting for 19% of country’s production. It was said that the considerable wool production amalgamated with installation of processing units would result in bolstering the economy of the UT.
It was informed that proper market interventions is being looked into for upliftment of raw wool from farmers. The lack of marketing interventions, processing infrastructure (scouring/carding etc) of the sector would be incentivized.It was said that the road map would be time-bound, innovative, self-sustaining therefore a factor in the local GDP.
Moreover it was given out that the plan would focus on creating capacity to convert raw wool in to value added products. It was said that it should not over look the basic source of the raw material i.e, wool, ascertained the meeting.