CM proposes release of Agriculture Infrastructure Fund
Source: Chronicle News Service / DIPR

Imphal, September 07 2021: Chief Minister N Biren on Tuesday attended a video conference of union minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Narendra Singh Tomar with the chief ministers on initiatives and schemes for farmers' welfare.

The objectives of the conference were to highlight salient features of Atmanirbhar Krishi for Atmanirbhar Bharat strategy and role of states, setting up of dedicated state teams with strong leadership to implement national programmes with state's specific inputs, enabling states to enhance farmers incomes and state GDP and knowledge sharing amongst states and centre of new and innovative initiatives and develop a spirit of collaboration.

Giving his presentation, N Biren stated that the state government has been making all possible efforts to ensure effective implementation of flagship schemes for the welfare of the farming community.

He proposed that if Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF) could be made available to the state then it would be easier to uplift the agricultural entrepreneurs as it has started providing loans to start-ups on agriculture.

He informed that Only one agro entrepreneur from the state had applied for the scheme so far as applicants had to apply directly to the central government and many were not aware of the application procedure.

Speaking on the Pradhan Mantri Kihan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) and saturation of Kisan Credit Card (KCC), he said that total beneficiaries under the scheme in the state is 6,04,300 and a total of 30,284 KCCs has been issued.

He further added that a proposal for matching 8,179 PM-Kisan beneficiaries had been sent to the bank concerned for grant of KCC loan.

On the National Farmers Database with connectivity to state land records database, he informed that digitization of land records in the state is in good progress and also placed the status of computerization for certain districts.

Regarding the status of National Mission on Oilseeds & Oil Palm (NMOOP), the CM stated that state government had constituted a sub-committee of Oil Palm Manipur to oversee successful implementation of Oil Palm Project.

To test the suitability and economic viability of the crop, adaptive trials on 0.25 hectare has been conducted in 22 different locations.

Identification and acquisition of land for about 30 hectares for setting up of Oil Palm nursery at Jiribam is in progress and likely to be finalized soon, he added.

Biren also stressed on the need of technical and financial support from the central government in the implementation of schemes taken up for the welfare of farmers.

The video conference was also attended by union minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Piyush Goyal, chief ministers and Agriculture ministers of different states.

At the Chief Minister's Secretariat, Agriculture minister Oinam Lukhoi and commissioner (Agriculture) M Joy attended the conference along with CM.

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