Rasi 659 variety of seeds preferred by farmers to be available
Adilabad: The agriculture department is taking steps to make available varieties of cotton seed packets preferred by farmers in the market for Kharif to avoid protests. There were protests for the Rasi 659 cotton seed variety packets last year in Adilabad district.
Officials will give information about stocks to the farmers. Agriculture officials prepared an action plan for Kharif and estimated that the cotton crop will be cultivated in 4.40 lakh acres in Adilabad district. The area of cotton cultivation may increase in Kharif.
Farmers had protested demanding that the state government supply Rasi 659 in the Adilabad Assembly constituency. The variety was most preferred by farmers leading to a shortage. District officials involved seed distributors and enquired about the availability of the seeds at their stores. Agriculture extension officers will prepare village-wise schedule for purchase of cotton seeds on any day to prevent ruckus and unwanted incidents during the purchase of seeds. Officials are also going to form committees with police, agriculture officials and revenue and conduct raids on godowns to stop any illegal diversion of seeds to the black market and create an artificial shortage.
District agriculture officer Sridhar Swamy said they have estimated that 11,00,000 cotton seed packets would be required to cultivate the crop in 4.40 lakh acres in Adilabad district and added that seed distributors would make available of 21,60,000 cotton seed packets of different varieties in the market for the benefit of of farmers.
