Maharashtra government launches Rs 10,000 crore dryland agriculture mission

PUNE: Maharashtra government has launched Rs 10,000 crore dryland agriculture mission ( DAM) for the rainfed areas in the state.

In the first phase of the programme, one village from each rainfed taluka will be selected. "Thus Rs 150 crore have been earmarked for the first year for 347 villages," said mission director Sudam Adsool.

Dr YSP Thorat, former chairman of the National Bank for Agricultural and Rural Development ( Nabard) is the head of DAM.

Maharashtra has 82% area under rainfed conditions and droughts are a frequent phenomenon. The components of DAM include, agricultural development through farmers groups, farm ponds, micro irrigation, controlled agriculture, inter-cropping and double cropping, processing, value addition and marketing.

Different schemes of the state government will be pulled together for making funds available for DAM.