Asks for designating nodal officers for following timely funding and submission of UCs
SRINAGAR: Additional Chief Secretary (ACS), Animal Husbandry, Agriculture Production & Farmers Welfare Departments, Atal Dulloo today emphasised upon the Heads of all the allied departments to work on formulation of annual action plans for all the Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) forthwith so that there is timely release and utilization of funds in the UT.
He made these remarks while reviewing the performance made under these schemes by respective line departments.
The meeting was attended by Directors of Agriculture, Horticulture, Animal Husbandry, Sheep Husbandry of both the divisions; Director Sericulture and Command Area Development, besides other officers and officials of these departments.
The ACS urged all the heads to review the performance of these sectors regularly to register the expenditure as envisaged in the plan. He enjoined upon them to designate the nodal officers in each of the department who would follow-up the timely submission of utilization certificates by their offices and release of funds from the central government.
He directed the Directors of Finance and Planning of each department to coordinate with field offices for each of the purposes of plan formulation, timely submission for approval, regular monitoring and registration of expenditure as per the approved action plan.
Dulloo exhorted upon them to accelerate the sponsorship process of all the projects under NABARD. He advised them to initiate early for better results at the end abd identify other projects for sponsorship. He also asked them to work for extension of Saffron Mission and PARVAZ for the overall benefit of farmers in J&K.
Taking further note he asked the officers to work for enhancing the income of small and marginal farmers who constitute about 90% of farming community in the UT. He gave out that the traditional practices and agricultural input material needs to be replaced by the new varieties so as to exponentially increase returns for these marginal farmers.
He impressed upon them to look into the ways and means for doing the same. He pointed out that the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is going to collaborate with us in this regard. He proposed that the broad contours for the same should be like identification of some 10 crop varieties for GI tagging, seeking of technical support and marketing or value addition of our produce from this international organization. He told them to identify the resource persons in advance, having sufficient knowledge of the field to liaise with them.
It was given out in the meeting that an amount of Rs 38.34 crore has been spent by different wings of AP&FW Department under CSS like NMSA, PMFBY, NMAET, NFSM, PMKSY and others till March, 2022. In addition to these an amount of Rs 7.50 crores have been spent by the department under NABARD sponsored projects in the UT.
Similarly in Horticulture department an amount of Rs 13.70 crore have been spent on Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH) and Rs 66.70 crore under PM Development Plan (PMDP).
It was given out that all these schemes including that in Animal Husbandry department are aimed at modernization of the infrastructure and machinery for the producers. Besides its objectives are to enhance farmers income by providing them necessary support in terms of modern agricultural inputs and accessories for increasing the income of farmers in the UT of J&K.
