AgriNation News Network

Bengaluru| 20 Jan 2018

Advocating Mahatma Gandhi’s call – Back to the Village, in a seminar at Bengaluru on Friday, M Venkaiah Naidu, Vice President of India said, “Every agricultural student should be given practical exposure for at least six months to work with farmers.”

He was speaking on “Challenges and Opportunities Facing Indian Agriculture”, at the Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC) during the 47th Founder’s Day celebration.

Speaking on the occasion, he said, a medium-term and long-term action plans are needed to revitalize the farm sector.

“Farmers should get larger share of consumer price”, Naidu said.

He emphasized the use of quality seeds, balanced use of organic and inorganic fertilizers and nutrients, timely institutional credit, diversification to dairy, fishery, poultry, processing farm produce through time tested methods and soil health card are crucial for enhancing farm incomes.

Vice President asked to focus on reform, perform and transform of agriculture to protect nature and promote culture to protect the future.

He also said, “Higher investment in agriculture both from public and private sector is needed to attain 4 percent agri growth”.

Highlighting the need of institutional innovations in integrated farming systems through agricultural extension systems, he called for cultivating low water high value crops to save ground water as 70 percent of irrigation is provided by groundwater.

“A proper minimum support price policy should be formulated for groundwater crops to tackle the adversities caused due to high probability of well failure”, he added.

Governor of Karnataka Vaju Bhai Vala and Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilizers Ananth Kumar were also present at the seminar.