Gujarat Chief Minister reaches out to farmers at Krishi Mahotsav through videoconferencing
Narendra Modi asks farmers to build farm ponds and lay drip-irrigation pipelines, funded by NREGA and GOG schemes
Ahmedabad, Wednesday: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi today asked the farmers to build farm ponds (locally called ‘khet talavdi’) and lay pipelines for drip-irrigation before the monsoon sets in.Talking to about three lakh farmers through videoconferencing on the occasion of Krishi Mahotsav-2012, he said that while farm ponds scheme is Centrally funded by NREGA, Government of Gujarat offers 95 per cent assistance for drip-irrigation.
He said that area under drip irrigation in the state has increased from 10,000 ha to 5,00,000 ha over the last ten years – mainly for water-intensive crops like paddy, sugarcane and banana.
The Chief Minister said that it is in the state’s interest that every drop of water is conserved and it does not go back to the days of dry zones. It is in the same context he gave the slogans like ‘Per Drop More Crop’ and ‘Tons of Crop from Tips of Water’.
He said that nearly 6-lakh check dams, bori bunds and farm ponds build during the last ten years, besides Narmada and Sujalam Sufalam Canal Netwroks, have helped underground water table rise by three to thirteen metres as per the topography of the river basin. He said that terrace farming is also fast catching up in ravines of hilly regions in the state. Embankments are built in the driver deltas to check saline ingress in the coastal regions.
