VARANASI: On waiving agriculture loan, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Aditya Nath Yogi would take the final call in the first meeting of his cabinet sometime this week. A list of 1.5 crore farmers has been finalised and sent to the chief minister, said UP agriculture minister Surya Pratap Shahi.
The work on preparing the list of beneficiaries had been started immediately after the formation of the government, said Shahi.
While talking about other initiatives to help farmers, Shahi said, to meet the target of purchasing 80 lakh metric tonnes of wheat from the farmers, his department was setting up wheat purchase centres. These centres were being set up in a way that farmers do not have to travel more than seven kilometres to sell the produce.
Shahi said that minimum support price for wheat crop had also been fixed as Rs 1,625 per quintal. All these exercises were being made to double the income of farmers by 2022.
The government was exploring the possibility of using closed and unused cold storages to store wheat. The existing warehouses have the capacity of only 40 lakh mt, said agriculture minister.
Source:http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/
