State to urge Centre to ban import of arecanut'

District In-charge Minister U T Khader has said that the state government will resolve to urge the Centre to ban the import of arecanut.

“The resolution of the state government will be sent to the Centre,” he assured.

Khader was addressing the gathering at a meeting of the Agriculture, Horticulture and Cooperation Departments at the deputy commissioner’s hall on Wednesday.

He said that the arecanut growers were in distress following a steep fall in the price of arecanut. The members of farmers’ association had urged the minister to take measures to ban import of arecanut, keeping the interest of arecanut growers in mind.

Khader said, “The decision to ban the import should be taken by the Centre. I will hold a meeting with the agriculture and horticulture minister of Karnataka soon. A resolution demanding the ban on the import of arecanut will be submitted to the Centre.”

‘Paddy neglected’

Farmer Dhanakeerthi Balipa accused the Agriculture Department of neglecting paddy cultivators. The support price for paddy cultivation has not been released so far, he charged.

Reacting to it, the minister said that, to promote paddy cultivation in the coastal districts, the state budget had promised to release a support price of Rs 7,500 per acre. “The order will be issued shortly to release the amount,” he promised.

On demand to declare Dakshina Kannada as a drought-affected district, Khader said that taluks in the district had already been declared drought-affect a year ago.

“Funds have been released to take up drought relief works. The state government has waived the loans borrowed by farmers. The loans are being waived in a phased manner. The farmers should not lose confidence and become anxious over loan waiver,” he appealed.

Information centre

The farmers alleged that they do not get information from Agriculture and Horticulture Departments on the facilities available for farmers. Many of the benefits for farmers are lying in the Raitha Samparka Kendra, they added.

Deputy Commissioner Sasikanth Senthil promised to launch an information centre in association with farmers to make the information on the facilities provided by the departments available to the public.

When the farmers alleged that the crop insurance amount has not been released, Seetha, joint director of the Agriculture Department, and H R Nayak, deputy director of the Horticulture Department, both said that a total of 56,000 farmers had been registered under the crop insurance scheme.

The compensation amount has already been released to 50,000 farmers. The rest of the farmers will get the amount within a few days.

The deputy commissioner also urged the farmers to submit a complaint on the non-release of the compensation to the district administration.