Lup fumes over tardy progress of Chakhao cultivation in state
Source: Chronicle News Service
Imphal, June 22 2021:
All Club Organisation, Association & Meira Paibi Lup ((ACOAM Lup) has warned that it will impose ban on sale of Chak-hao and other value-added products from Manipur to save the uniqueness of Chak-hao rice if Monitoring Committee Chak-hao and Consortium of Chak-hao Growers fail to make aware government funded and private entrepreneurs as well as farmers about utilisation of GI properly.
Deeply saddened by a report published on news media website The Quint about speedy progress of Chak-hao cultivation in Chandauli area in Uttar Pradesh after procuring seeds from Manipur and promotion of black rice (Chak-hao) cultivation by the Uttar Pradesh government, ACOAM Lup said that organisation will file a PIL to find out reason behind slack Chak-hao cultivation in Manipur despite providing fund to farmers for more than four years.
Citing report of The Quint, a statement of ACOAM Lup said that Chak-hao cultivation in Chandauli area in UP started in the year 2017 in 1500 hectares with seeds procured from Manipur and the cultivation area has expanded to 6500 hectares now with the UP government promoting cultivation of the unique rice under its one district one product scheme.
However, Manipur government seems be to lacking interest in marketing and promotion of Chak-hao cultivation.
It got CI tag in the year 2020 but farmers cultivating Chak-hao as well as entrepreneurs getting funding from MOVCDNER are unaware about utilisation of GI tag or how to use it.
Apart from this, farmers cultivating Chak-hao are unsure of whether Chak-hao rice they cultivated are GI tag one or not, ACOAM Lup said and alleged Chakhao Monitoring Committee formed just after getting GI tag of failing to take any step on maintenance and jurisdiction of GI tag despite the committee comprising experts.
According to the Lup, MOVCDNER's agency, MOMA's marketing and promotion strategy on Chak-hao too is questionable as the agency shares information to its funded organisations and society only and not to other private players.
As MOMA's fund on marketing and promotion is restricted to local publicity, black rice (Chak-hao) cultivated in UP after procuring seeds from Manipur has become more popular and is on the verge of getting GI tag by giving another name to the unique rice originating from Manipur, ACOAM Lup said and appealed to farmers to stand together to save the identity of Chak-hao rice.