The agriculture department has made adequate preparations to achieve 30% Seed Replacement Rate (SRR) in wheat crop for the ensuing Rabi 2013-14 season.Nearly, 15315 qtls of wheat seed has already been stocked against a total requirement of 43215 qtls of departmental seed in Jammu region while the process for distribution of different seeds of Rabi crops is in full swing.This was revealed at a meeting convened by Minister for Agriculture Ghulam Hassan Mir to review the preparation and arrangements of various inputs for the ensuing Rabi season at Jammu.Director Agriculture, Jammu Ajay Khajuria apprised the Minister that latest rust resistant varieties of wheat like PBW-621, HD-2967 and Raj-3777 besides PBW-550 released by DWR, Karnal and IARI have been placed in the supply chain. Besides, full arrangements have been made to put in place Centrally Sponsored Seed Village Programme to minimize dependence on external agencies. It was also disclosed in the meeting that 1000 lits of Propiconizole fungicide have been stocked at different zonal stores to take prophylactic measures and to deal with any eventual outbreak of yellow rust in the coming season. Similarly, for other Rabi seeds sufficient stocks are available and 462 qtls of oilseeds, 223 qtls of Pulses and 3571 qtls of Fodder seeds have already been dispatched to different stores of the Jammu pision to meet the current requirement.
The Minister also reviewed the supply and availability of various fertilizers for Rabi season. It was disclosed that 55184.31 MT’s of Urea, 24218 MT’s of DAP and 2754 M.T’s of MOP have been made available to the farmers of State during Kharif 2013 cropping season. During the month of October, 3943.85 M.T’s of Urea, 11266 M.T’s of DAP and 2527 M.T’s of MOP has been stocked in the State to ensure the timely availability of fertilizers to the farmers during the current Rabi season. Further 11350 M.T’s of Urea, 8700 M.T’s of DAP and 3000 M.T’s of MOP are in the supply plan approved by Govt. of India for the supply through different companies for the month of November to ensure adequate supply to the farmers for application of basal dose of fertilizers to the crops. Besides, supplies of SSP and NPK (12:32:16) complex are also being ensured for the farming community for making judicious/ balanced use of fertilizers to get good crop production during the current rabi season. The distribution/ transportation of the fertilizers is being made by the concerned companies different districts as per the demand put forth by different institutional agencies.Director Agriculture further apprised the minister that department has made an intensive programme to demonstrate and promote the use of Agriculture Machinery and modern implements and all efforts will be made to achieve the targets fixed for coming Rabi season. Dr S. S. Jamwal, Joint Director (Ext), Jammu, Susheel Sahni, Joint Director (Inputs), Jammu, Sudesh Koul, Deputy Director (Trainings), C. M. Sharma, Deputy Director (Central), A. K. Bhatti, Deputy Director (Planning) Jammu and other officers of the department attended the meeting.