Co-operatives to buy paddy from farmers in West Bengal

Co-operatives will buy paddy from farmers on the back of Rs 400 crore bank guarantee offered by the West Bengal government. This was indicated by the state agriculture minister Purnendu Basu at the 5th Agro Protech 2015 on Thursday.

Basu said “Co-operatives will buy paddy from farmers on the back of Rs 400 crore bank guarantee offered by the state government. We are offering a price of Rs 1425 per quintalin krishi mandis to counter distress sale of paddy”. West Bengal is the largest rice producing state in the country.

He informed that India is very high on bio-diversity with over 7% of the animal species worldwide living in the country. Pointing to increased rural urban migration, he called for greater gender equality in agri policy formulation and implementation. Informing that the state of West Bengal has received the Krishi Karman Award for coarse cereals, he called for farm mechanization to increase agri productivity. He informed that the state is instituting the Krishi Ratna award at the block level to incentivize the farmers.
Arup Roy, the state agricultural marketing minister informed that the state agriculture is dominated by small and marginal farmers. He elaborated about innovative state government initiatives like “Amar fasal, Amar Gari” & “Amar fasal, Amar Gola” which has been introduced to support better agri marketing initiatives and storage facilities for agri produce. While the state government of West Bengal is actively seeking to award remunerative prices to the farmers, it is also working towards ensuring fair price for consumers Mr. Roy informed.

Krishnendu Narayan Choudhury, minister of Food Processing Industries & Horticulture said that in view of the fact that there has been an increasing trend of conversion of agricultural land to non-agricultural use, due to increasing population pressure, there needs to be a review of the existing Land ceiling Act. He added that extensive usage of chemical fertilizers has adversely affected soil health and organic farming can be a plausible way out in West Bengal.