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Krishna Byre Gowda, Minister for Agriculture, said on Sunday that mechanised farming was the only way for farmers to make paddy cultivation profitable.

He was here to inaugurate a mega campaign for mechanised paddy cultivation organised by the Department of Agriculture at the paddy fields of Agrahara.

Mr. Gowda said that the traditional method of paddy cultivation was labour intensive, time consuming and less profitable.

The traditional method of paddy cultivation cost nearly Rs. 24,000 an acre, whereas mechanised cultivation would cost about Rs. 10,000 an acre.

Paddy was the main kharif crop of Udupi district. There was 1.3 lakh acres of land under paddy cultivation here. But hardly 5,000 acres of cultivation was under mechanised farming. Mechanised farming would solve a lot of problems of farmers of coastal district, especially labour shortage.

Even when the farm workers were available, the farmers had to pay about Rs. 400 for a female farm worker and Rs. 600 for male farm worker.

This hiked the cost of production significantly. If paddy nurseries were raised through the Paddy Nursery Raising Machine and transplanting in the fields was done by the paddy transplanter, it would do away with the need for labour to a large extent.

The harvesting too could be done with the help of a paddy harvester.

The Department of Agriculture had set up Customer Hire Service Centres, where farmers could take some agricultural equipment on rent.

He directed officials of the Agriculture Department to take the help of women’s self-help groups and NGOs to popularise mechanised paddy farming.

They could provide trays of paddy saplings made from Paddy Nursery Raising Machines to farmers. They could also help in the use of paddy transplanters.

The Agriculture Department should hold a meeting of women’s SHGs, diploma holders and train them in these matters. They should also be given a target to achieve so that there was faster expansion of area under mechanised paddy cultivation.

Package deals

The department could offer package deals for farmers. Farmers should be encouraged to grow two crops of paddy under mechanised farming in a year in the district, Mr. Gowda said.

Pramod Madhwaraj, Minister of State for Fisheries, Youth Services and Sports; Shobha Karandlaje, MP; and Dinaker Babu, president of Udupi Zilla Panchayat were present.

Campaign to

promote

mechanised

paddy cultivation launched in UdupiU