Agriculture Minister Singireddy Niranjan Reddy asked agricultural marketing officials to prepare a plan to regulate the arrivals of rabi produce into market yards, although the State government is not taking up procurement.
In a meeting with officials held here on Saturday, he made it clear that there was no possibility of government taking up procurement of the farm produce as part of minimum support price (MSP) operations since the new farm laws have no provision of MSP. Stating that it was the Centre that had to decide on the matter of MSP, he suggested the officials to explain to the farming community about the State government’s inability to take up procurement this season.
He, however, stated that the government would regulate the arrivals into market yards to prevent glut, which could lead to artificial slump in the price of commodities, besides creating shortage of storage facilities. He asked the officials to provide opportunity of trading in all the 191 market yards and 72 sub-market yards in the State.
As per current estimates, paddy is likely to be cultivated in about 50 lakh acres and the production is likely to be about 1.13 crore tonnes. He instructed the agriculture extension officers to ensure 100% crop booking so as to regulate the arrivals into market yards and to help the department issue coupons to farmers to bring their produce to markets in a scheduled manner.
Stating that delay in harvest of rabi crop could result in losses due to untimely rains, the Minister told the officials to educate farmers about the necessity to complete harvesting before March-end.
Secretary (Agriculture) B. Janardhan Reddy, Director of Marketing G. Lakshmi Bai, Director of Horticulture L. Venkatrami Reddy, Managing Director of TS-Markfed V. Bhaskara Chary, all District Agricultural Officers and marketing officers participated in the meeting held at Bowenpally market.
