The scare of coronavirus spread is making several government departments linked to people to come up with new ideas by preventing gathering of people, including communities such as farmers at procurement centres and market yards to dispose of their produce. In one such innovative step, the State government is planning village-wise procurement of maize and paddy this season.
Minister for Agriculture S. Niranjan Reddy, Civil Supplies Minister G. Kamalakar and Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar held a meeting here on Monday to discuss measures for procurement of paddy and maize this rabi/yasangi season. Mr. Niranjan Reddy stated that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has directed the Finance Department to provide bank guarantee to the Civil Supplies Corporation to the tune of ₹25,000 crore for procurement of paddy.
Secretary (Agriculture) B. Janardhan Reddy, Chairman of Civil Supplies Corporation M. Srinivas Reddy, Chairman of TS-Markfed M. Ganga Reddy, Commissioner of Civil Supplies P. Satyanarayan Reddy, Cooperative Commissioner M. Veerabrahmaiah, Director (Marketing) G. Laxmi Bai, Director of Seed Development Corporation K. Keshavulu, Managing Directors of TS-Markfed and TS-Agros V. Bhaskara Chary and A. Ramulu discussed the steps to be taken in the wake of coronavirus spread.
Official sources stated that although the Civil Supplies Department has asked for ₹18,000 crore bank guarantee, the Chief Minister was said to have suggested that it would not be enough to procure paddy produced in about 39.25 lakh acres this season. The Markfed has been told to commence procurement of maize with a support price of ₹1,760 per quintal from Tuesday itself by arranging tokens to farmers in advance.
The Civil Supplies Corporation was planning to procure paddy through 4,000 centre this season against 3,500 during the kharif season. However, the Chief Minister was learnt to have told the officials to ensure than farmers do not come to urban market yards and it was possible only by opening at least 8,000 procurement centres this season, although there were 12,746 gram panchayats for several thandas were upgraded.
Mr. Niranjan Reddy told the officials to assess the village wise production of paddy and make arrangements including procurement of sufficient gunny bags and tarpaulin sheets since unseasonal rains occur sometimes during the rabi harvesting. The officials were told to procure at least 60,000 new tarpaulins to protect the paddy procured and sufficient moisture content measuring instruments.
