The Ministry of Agriculture has prepared district contingency plans for 320 districts. States have been advised to prepare location specific alternatives based on these plans in consultation with respective State Agricultural Universities and arrange seeds of alternate crops/varieties to implement such plans. Arrangements for adequate availability of seeds have been made to meet the requirements of these contingency plans. This information was given by K V Thomas, minister for consumer affairs, food and public distribution system, in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.
A diesel subsidy scheme to save the standing crops to mitigate the hardships of farmers, especially that of small and marginal farmers has also been approved.
The minister said that a meeting of state food secretaries was called on August 1, 2012 to review the procurement arrangements for Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2012-2013. As per estimates given by food secretaries of various states, rice procurement during KMS 2012-2013 is estimated to be 401.31 lakh tonnes compared to the estimate of 353.15 lakh tonnes for KMS 2011-2012. Therefore, it appears that procurement of rice for the central pool is not likely to be affected from the prevailing monsoon position. During KMS 2011-2012, 347.40 lakh tonnes of rice has already been procured upto August 8, 2012. In addition, a record quantity of 381.48 lakh tonnes of wheat has been procured during Rabi Marketing Season (RMS) 2012-2013, compared to 283.35 lakh tonnes of wheat during RMS 2011-2012. Due to record procurement of wheat and rice, the central pool stock position is comfortable and as on August 1, 2012, 285.03 lakh tonnes of rice and 475.26 lakh tonnes of wheat was available in the central pool against the buffer and strategic reserve norm (for July 1, 2012) of 118 lakh tonnes of rice and 201 lakh tonnes of wheat. Stocks available in the central pool are more than sufficient to meet the requirement of the targeted public distribution system (TPDS) and other schemes, the minister added.
