UN asked to declare 2018 as International Year of Millets

Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh has sent a proposal to United Nations for declaring 2018 as "International Year of Millets" to raise awareness among consumers, policy makers, industry and research sector, it was announced on Wednesday.

"Promotion of production and consumption of millets through conscious efforts at global level is likely to contribute substantially in the fight against targeted hunger and mitigate the effect of climate change in long run," he said in his letter to the global body.

Popularizing millets would benefit future generations of farmers as well as consumers, he said in the letter dated November 10.

Millet is a common term to categorise small-seeded grasses that are often termed nutri-cereals or dryland-cereals, and includes sorghum, pearl millet, ragi, small millet, foxtail millet, proso millet, barnyard millet, kodo millet and other millets.

--IANS

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