Irrigation Minister T. Harish Rao has directed the officials of Marketing Department to initiate steps for procuring cotton from farmers.
The yield during the current season was expected to be of the order of 70 lakh bales as against 50 lakh bales of 2016-17 and the officials concerned should take steps to procure the commodity from farmers. The officials should conduct awareness camps for farmers and ensure that the agriculture extension officers take special interest in understanding the issues facing the ryots at the grassroots level. The Minister, who reviewed the crop situation with senior officials on Wednesday, wanted them to increase the procurement centres to 150 against the 84 set up in the previous year. Emphasis should be on promoting cotton seed oil giving it industry status if need be besides taking up steps to prevent export of cotton seed to States like Haryana and Gujarat.
He instructed them to take up with the Central Government the issue of enhancing the incentives to cotton exporters from three to five per cent.
The officials were asked to convince the Centre to direct the Cotton Corporation of India to procure cotton that was damaged during the cyclone season of the previous year.
The Centre should take steps to set up laboratories at Adilabad, Warangal, Siddipet and Hyderabad for testing quality of the cotton. besides ensuring that machines were supplied to ryots on subsidy to ensure that there was no damage to the crop.
