Jammu: The Jammu and Kashmir administration is working on provision of subsidy on seeds and fertilisers for the next crop to facilitate affected farmers, Lieutenant Governor’s Advisor Farooq Khan said on Wednesday as he reviewed crop losses due to recent rains and hailstorm in the Jammu division.
Khan was speaking to a group of farmers who met him at the Civil Secretariat here and said immense losses have occurred to agricultural crops like paddy, vegetables, potato, fodder and oil seeds, an official spokesman said.
He said the farmers appealed for providing adequate compensation to those who suffered losses due to incessant rains.
“The government is working on providing subsidies on seed and fertilisers for the next crop to facilitate the farmers,” the advisor said.
The advisor issued directions to the field functionaries of the agriculture department to conduct joint survey along with revenue officials by organising meetings with the farmers of all villages to get and prepare detailed digitalised report of crop damages at the earliest.
He enjoined upon the insurance companies to immediately settle the claims of crops under the PM Fasal Bima Yojana.
The farmers further anticipated losses to rabi crops due to excessive moisture in soil leading to delayed sowing.
Khan asked the officers to assess the realistic impact of inclement weather conditions on the agriculture sector and extend technical hand to farmers for tackling the situation emerging from the prevailing scenario by devising a strategy for the upcoming rabi season to compensate crop losses to some extent, the spokesman said.
Regarding the paddy straw problem, he recommended popularisation of the use of a decomposer to dispose of the logged paddy straw.
He also instructed the agriculture department to plan for opening of maize procurement markets in maize-growing districts as soon as possible.
