Bangalore: Despite huge investment into the agricultural sector, Dr P.G. Chengappa, University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS) Vice-Chancellor has expressed the grief that due to the country's failure to register 4% cent growth in agriculture as targeted in the 11th Five-Year Plan, the growth rate is still below 2% cent.
Dr. Chengappa, based on a survey, highlighted the condition of agriculture in the state, recently, while inaugurating an awareness programme on the National Agricultural Innovative Project intended at enhancing agricultural productivity through the Integrated Farming System (IFS), organized by UAS, the Indian Council for Agricultural Research and the Institute of Agricultural Technologies (IAT).
According to the survey, about 90% of the farmers in the state are still debt-ridden. A farmer on an average owns merely 1.6 hectares of land which leads to an annual income that is much less than that of a daily wage worker. About 75 per cent of them are small and marginal farmers and nearly 75 lakh families are dependant on agriculture in the state.
Dr Chengappa while highlighting the vital factors upon which the growth of agriculture depended advised the need to provide farmers with advanced technology. Subsidized seeds and farming equipment should reach the intended beneficiaries, while an inclusive policy for the growth of farmers should be drafted.
Further, Dr Chengappa mentioned that the IFS project is implemented keeping in view the objective of increasing the increasing revenue, and thereby improving the livelihood of farmers in Chitradurga and Bidar districts. As per sources, Union Government launched the IFS project, which is a consortium of departments associated directly or indirectly to agriculture such as Animal Husbandry, Fisheries and Sericulture, in 150 backward districts of the country.
