THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With the state budget on Friday, agriculture expert R. Haley hopes the state will form the long overdue farmers’ welfare board. The draft bill is with the law department, for what is likely to be a first in the country. Agriculture minister V. S. Sunil Kumar is also keen to see that the current budget session of the Legislative Assembly passes the bill which would be seen as a feather in his cap.
It should be recalled that the union agriculture department had changed its name to agriculture development and farmers’ welfare in 2015 which saw the State Government also changing it with the aim of protecting the farmers’ overall welfare. Since the last two years, agricultural experts have been demanding that the State Government form the farmers’ welfare board.
The previous UDF Government had formed a seven- member subcommittee comprising Chittur MLA K. Krishnankutty as its chairman and former agriculture director R. Haley, as member of the draft agricultural development policy where their main recommendation was to form the farmers’ welfare board.
“Once the farmers’ welfare board is formed, it is going to be a more revolutionary move than the land reforms bill. By forming the board, we are not only aiming at a production hike alone, but want to see farming a changing exercise among the youth”, said Haley.
The subcommittee had come out with a draft agriculture development policy during 2013 and Rs 25 lakh was earmarked in successive budgets. But unfortunately since the bill was not formed, the allocated money could never be utilized.
Recently the department had organised its second leg of the Value Addition for Income Generation in Agriculture (VAIGA) under Good Agricultural Practice (GAP). But Haley is upset that the LDF Government has not come out with the reports of the recently concluded session as well as that of the previous years. Since 2017, as part of delivering good quality organic vegetables to consumers, only those products which come under GAP have hit the festive markets.
