Hyderabad, Oct 30 : In what is claimed to be the first of its kind initiative in India, the Telangana government is building farmers’ platforms (Rythu Vedika) across the state to bring them together to help achieve their ultimate objective of higher returns for their produce.
The state government has embarked on constructing a Rythu Vedika in all the Agriculture Extension Officer’s clusters. For this, it has earmarked Rs 572.22 crore.
Each Rythu Vedika has two rooms and two toilets with a plinth area of 2,046 square feet. They will be provided electricity and tap water connections.
Out of 2,601 Rythu Vedikas to be constructed, 1,951 have been completed while construction of another 650 is in progress.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao will inaugurate the first Rythu Vedika on Saturday at Kodakandla mandal headquarters in Jangaon district. He will address farmers and general public to explain the reasons behind setting up of the Rythu Vedika, their importance, programmes and utilities.
Each Vedika is being built at a cost of Rs 22 lakh, of which Rs 12 lakh will be provided by the Agriculture Department. The remaining amount will be met from MNREGS funds.
Rythu Vedikas will help in mobilising the farmers to organise themselves into groups for attaining their ultimate objective of getting the remunerative prices, better marketing facilities, higher productivity and ultimately making agriculture profitable, explained an official.
The platform will also help the government know the ground level basic problems and difficulties faced by the farmers and to formulate new strategies and upgrading the existing system to make the agriculture more profitable and sustainable.
Rythu Vedika is also expected to play a crucial role in successful implementation of the regulated farming introduced by the government. Under this policy, the Agriculture Department will suggest to farmers what they should cultivate in a particular area.
This will make farming regulated and remunerative based on the global market intelligence. Rythu Vedika will serve as a platform to create awareness among the farmers to know about all the farmers’ welfare schemes taken up by the government, subsidies available etc.
Agriculture and allied departments can use these platforms as skill imparting centres.
The platform is expected to help stabilise the income of farmers by providing the information on the institutional finance and to ensure their continuance in farming.
It will also encourage farmers to adopt innovative and modern agriculture practices, ensure flow of credit to the agriculture and allied sectors, help the farmers to interact and share the knowledge.
The Rythu Vedika can be used as a venue to conduct and organise trainings and awareness campaigns on the latest agriculture know-how by the Agriculture and allied Departments. It will also help the farmers organise themselves into groups to protect their rights .
According to officials, there will be 2,462 rural Rythu Vedikas and 139 urban Rythu Vedikas. For 24 buildings, donors have come forward to bear the entire expenditure. For 139 buildings, the donors have given land.
Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from IANS service.