Centre will do everything to ensure income of NE farmers is doubled: Tomar

Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare Narendra Singh Tomar on Thursday assured that the Central government will do everything in its capacity to ensure the income of the farmers of the North-Eastern region is doubled.

Tomar and Union Minister of Tourism, Culture, and Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) G Kishan Reddy co-chaired a meeting to review the progress of various schemes of the Government of India in the Agriculture sector in states of the NER virtually from Vignan Bhavan, New Delhi today.

Addressing the North Eastern States, Tomar said, "The GOI will do everything in its capacity to ensure that the income of the farmers of the NER region is doubled. Our door is always open. I request all State Governments to come up with a proposal if you find any difficulty in any schemes related to the agriculture sector."

He said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi put special emphasis on the development of the North Eastern Region.

Speaking on the opportunities in the oil palm sector, Tomar said, "ICAR suggested that 9 lakh hectare land in the North East is suitable for oil palm production. Due to the oil palm production farmers of the NER will be hugely benefitted, employment will be generated and import of oil palm can be reduced. Thus, North East has a major role to play to make India self-reliant in edible oil."

The Minister said there are some horticulture and medicinal crops only produced in North-Eastern State.

He said that Agriculture and Commerce Ministry are working together to tap such opportunities and to solve the logistic problems faced by the North Eastern States.

The Agriculture Minister also requested State Government to focus on Natural Farming and said that the PM's vision to minimize the dependence of farmers on purchased inputs through Zero budget Natural farming that reduces the cost of agriculture by relying on traditional field-based technologies which leads to improved soil health through natural farming should be fulfilled.

He also congratulated Sikkim and the other North States for their achievements in organic farming.

Reddy, while addressing the states suggested that a task force be formed with representatives from Agriculture Ministry, DoNER, and State governments to ensure that the schemes of Agriculture Ministry are saturated for the Northeastern Region and the schemes can be customized to address the unique nature and the nuances encountered in the Northeast Region.

He further said that post-harvest management also needs to be improved by involving FPOs, SHGs, and the private sector.

In the meeting, Agriculture Ministers of the Northeastern states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, and Tripura discussed the issues and challenges they were facing in detail.