ZIRO, 30 May: The International Year of Millets was celebrated in a befitting manner here in Lower Subansiri district on 30 May.
The agriculture department organised an awareness campaign on the importance of millets, exhibitions displaying millet food products, an interaction session between farmers and agriculture scientists, and a buyers-sellers meet to mark the occasion.
Deputy Commissioner Bamin Nime, who inaugurated a meet at the Abotani Hall here as part of the celebration, said that millet was once considered the poor man’s food, compared to rice. “However, with the change of time and food habits, millets have now become an essential food item, considering their high nutritional and health benefits,” he said.
Exhorting the farmers of the district to “take up millet cultivation seriously in the face of paucity of land in the Ziro valley,” Nime also appealed
to the unemployed youths to “take up farming for self-employment and income generation in the face of declining white-collar jobs.”
District Agriculture Officer Tasso Butung informed that “the United Nations General Assembly has declared 2023 as the International Year of Millets, which was a vision and initiative of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”
Butung said that Lower Subansiri has been given the opportunity to host the meet, involving farmers from Lower Subansiri, Upper Subansiri, Kamle, Kra Daadi and Kurung Kumey districts.
“Similar awareness campaigns will soon be conducted at the block level in Yazali, Yachuli, Talo, and Param Putu circles,” he informed.
Among others, Veterinary & Animal Husbandry Officer Dr Hano Tama, PHED&WS EE Kago Habung, Farmer’s Training Centre Peripatetic Training Officer Leegang Anya, Yachuli-based KVK Head Dr Hage Munth, KVK horticulture scientist Dr SK Chaturvedi, farmers, and members of several SHGs attended the meet. (DIPRO)
