Meeting with agro-scientists to focus on increased crop production

Kolkata: The state Agriculture department is soon going to hold a high-level meeting with agro-scientists from all its research stations to discuss measures for further enhancement regarding the yield of different crops in the state as per demand in the market.

Asish Banerjee, the state Agriculture minister, said: "We have decided to hold the meeting with scientists and concerned officials from all the research stations."

He further said: "The date of the meeting will be finalised soon. But there are possibilities of the same getting organised by end of June or beginning of July and would also take place at Nabanna Sabhaghar."

In the meeting there will be agro-scientists from the rice research stations of the state Agriculture department at Chinsurah in Hooghly and Bankura. It may be mentioned that besides the increase in production of paddy, Bengal has also witnessed introduction of new varieties of seeds in the past few years. Agro-scientists in the rice research stations had been constantly working on different varieties of rice seeds. In the meeting, the agro-scientists from the rice research stations would be putting forward their views and would also discuss issues that will come up in the meeting in connection with paddy cultivation.

Scientists from the research stations of the state Agriculture department including pulses and oilseed research station at Behrampore, field crop research station in Burdwan and Water Management Research Station (WMRS) will also be present in the meeting. Initiatives have also been taken regarding cultivation of rice that needs less water and it will also be discussed during the meeting.

It may be mentioned that Bengal has bagged the Krishi Karman award for five consecutive years from the Centre for its success in the agriculture sector and the improvement has come after the change of guard in 2011 when the state government has started taking steps to ensure market-driven production.

Despite bagging the awards, the state Agriculture department is still taking all necessary measures to continue with the development of the sector.

At the same time, the state Agriculture department has taken up a drive to ensure that farmers do not burn stubble after the harvest as it creates huge amount of pollution and at the same time, the fertility of the soil also gets affected.

Officials of the state Agriculture department posted in districts are also approaching farmers to make them aware of the harm it is causing to agricultural lands.