Govt announces dynamic I card for Goan farmers
PTI, PANAJI | 12 June 2012 12:45 IST
Farmers in Goa will soon get Identity Cards (IDs) with electronic chips which will contain all details about their crops, land holdings, borrowing and farming history.
Making this announcement yesterday, Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar said the state Agriculture Department will give these cards to farmers, who will be loaned interest free money by state-run Economic Development Corporation (EDC) for six months depending on their crops.
The farmer can get upto Rs 20,000 per acre advance money which will be interest-free for six months, Parrikar said.
The work to compile a database would begin in next two months.
The cards will have all the information about the farmers, including his cultivation and also farmland owned by him.
"This card will be ten times better than Kissan Credit Card given by Union government," Parrikar claimed adding that the cards can be used to avail all farmers related government schemes.
The Goa government, he said, targets 6 per cent annual growth in agriculture for the current financial year, which would be scaled up to 10 per cent for the next financial year.
The chief minister said the government is also working on minimum support price for ten varieties of locally grown vegetables.
"The state-run Horticulture corporation will implement this scheme. The farmer can produce any amount of vegetables and we will support them with the minimum price," he said.
The Goa government has also decided to review its earlier policy and allow arm licences for the farmers to protect their crops from menacing animals.
Government should also make provision to take over the uncultivated land from the owners who are not interested to cultivate and are waiting to sell agricultural land by converting it to non agricultural land.
The agricultural department can take the initiative to cultivate this land.
Land under litigation could also be cultivated by the Agricultural department by taking adequate permission from the court.
these steps will ensure that this state agricultural resources is not wasted.