Director Agriculture Kashmir pitches for promotion of FPOs

Srinagar, July 04: The Director Agriculture Kashmir Chowdhury Mohammad Iqbal on Thursday chaired an interactive meeting with the FPO members of Both Kashmir and Jammu Divisions “for improving the working of FPO’s” at agriculture complex Lalmandi Srinagar.
Addressing the meeting Director Agriculture highlighted the importance of FPOs for small farmers. He said that small land holders constitute a vast majority of farmers in the UT of J&K, in addition small holders are especially vulnerable to climate change, aggregated weather events, like untimely rain, severe drought and floods, hailstorm and pest infestation any of which could wipe out their crops, therefore the (FPO’s) farmers producer organizations play an important role and enables farmers to get the benefits of economics of scale.
FPO’s help farmers to get benefit from shared resources, get better access to the markets and latest technologies, he said and added. He impressed upon the concerned officers from both the divisions to work in close coordination with the FPO’S and address their issues on priority basis.
Director Agriculture asked the participants, officers of the departments to play their role for the successful implementation of the projects under holistic agriculture development programme. he underlined the importance of collaborative approach for achieving the set targets under different projects.
Earlier Director Agriculture visited Seed Multiplication farm Gangbug and took stock of the agriculture activities there.
The meeting was attended by FPO members from both the divisions of J&K, Concerned officers in person and through virtual mode.