Thiruvananthapuram: There have been few takers for plantain farming and other agriculture projects, but the city corporation seems firm on urban farming. The budget for 2017-2018 has set aside funds for agriculture and animal husbandry projects. Last year, there were spillover projects for honeybee and mushroom farming. But the number of beneficiaries who were interested in it was zero. Even a day after the budget, only one percent of Rs 8.31 lakh, a spillover fund set aside for plantain farming, has been used.
Agriculture department officials are sure that the percentage will not shift in the remaining days of March. Still Rs 5 lakh has been set aside this year as well. Most beneficiaries have lined up for vegetable farming. But even in this case, only 11 percent of a spillover budget of Rs 2.118 crore has been used by March 22. The percentage will change by the month-end as more beneficiaries are coming forward. “We are given a beneficiary list, which is approved in the council. But when agriculture officers contact the beneficiaries, they would not be interested. Another problem is that the beneficiary list will not get approved on time, and eventually it would not be possible to farm as per the agriculture calendar,” said an official in the agriculture department.
The situation is equally dismal in the case of dairy farming. Though the corporation was offering support to dairy units, the amount given would be as low as Rs 15,000. “Cattle can cost Rs 75,000 or more, and so the beneficiaries do not prefer to be part of such a project,” an animal husbandry department official said. Poultry farming had a beneficiary list of 4,000, and close to 1,500 people benefited from it. This, according to the official, is a good percentage.
