The Telangana Government has asked farmers to diversify and look beyond growing paddy as the State is constructing irrigation projects to bring more areas under cultivation. It has asked farmers to consider growing horticultural crops that give better incomes.

State Agriculture Minister S Niranjan Reddy told farmers not to stick to paddy as they get more water. “We need paddy to meet our demand. There is no future if you continue to stick to paddy. You need to look at crops that give you more incomes,” he said.

He was addressing the farmers at the International Seed Testing Association here on Thursday. “The Chief Minister is promoting crop colonies, encouraging farmers to grow crops that suit their lands. In order to tap the export potential, we should change our farm practices in order to remove pesticide residues in the produce,” he said.

He cited the example of Maharashtra, which made significant strides in horticultural crops.

Gutta Sukhender Reddy, President of Rythu Samanvaya Samithi (which oversees implementation of farm support scheme Rythu Bandhu), asked farmers to go for crops that have good demand in the market.

C Parthasarathi, Principal Secretary Agriculture, has said the government proposed to give identity cards to seed farmers. “These cards will be useful in the disbursal of various government schemes. We will capture all the data of seed farmers in the cards,” he said.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW