YINGKIONG, 11 Dec: Agriculture commissioner Bidol Tayeng urged the villagers and women self-help groups (SHGs) of Upper Siang district to stop opium cultivation.
Tayeng made the appeal during his visit to Mariyang, Damro, Milang, Dalbing, Adi Pasi, Padu and Sili villages from 8 to 11 December.
Upper Siang district was considered as one of the traditionally opium growing areas in the state but he has been informed by the people that opium is not grown anymore.
Tayeng expressed serious concern over the reported penetration of chemical-based drugs into the district from outside the state, which is causing more harm to the youths as told by the villagers. He said that a strong unified effort from the administration, police with support from the local populace is needed to check the drug problem.
During his tour, Tayeng interacted with around 40 women SHGs in all these villages, besides conducting field visits to their farms to assess the ground realities and to review the implementation of various government flagships schemes.
Upper Siang district has taken up cultivation of different varieties of millets on a large-scale.
During the interaction with farmers, the farmers informed the Commissioner that they need fencing materials from the government to protect their fields from mithuns. At the same time, the farmers also said that they are unhappy with the fluctuating market rates of large cardamom and ginger.
During his field visit, the Commissioner observed that scientific land terracing was in more demand from the farmers as this was the only solution to area expansion for both agriculture and horticulture crops.
Citing the benefits of organic farming, the Commissioner urged the farmers to avoid chemical fertilizers and advised them to go for natural farming and organic cultivation.
The credit linked scheme “Atma Nirbhar Krishi Yojana” was sanctioned to few farmers. However, none of them were provided with any information about the loan portion.
DAO Dana Moyong said that since the implementation of the programme during 2020-21, the department has put its best effort to maintain communication with concerned banks.
“But despite repeated complaints and requests, the banks are willfully not providing the copy of the sanction order to the DAOs,” Moyong said.
“Thus, DAOs are not aware about the sanction and so could not be involved in implementing and monitoring the scheme properly,” he said. The DAO further disclosed, “It is also learnt that the bank loans components are not being released but only the government subsidies are being released to the farmers.”
In the meantime, the farmers have also lamented that the responses of the banks are very poor and the schemes are being sanctioned without following the season of the crops.
Apart from discussing several issues pertaining to boosting up agricultural activities in the district, challenging factors of marketing of products were discussed.
During the visit, Tayeng was accompanied by Mariyang ADC Akan Regon, DOA Dana Moyong, ADO Promila Megu Pertin and other officials. (DIPRO)
