CS holds meeting to pave way for ‘brand’ Matir Shristi
Kolkata: Chief Secretary H K Dwivedi on Friday directed for provision of market linkage of produce from Matir Shristi sites through existing and new Sufal Bangla outlets and also consider packaging and branding potential of such produce. He held a review meeting in presence of senior officials of concerned departments with District Magistrates attending virtually to take stock of the progress of Matir Shristi scheme, formation and registration of FPOs (Farmer Producer Organisations), Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF) and convergence of agriculture and allied departments, particularly at the field level for executing the projects in the best possible manner.
The districts have already identified 69 new clusters under the ongoing phase III of Matir Shristi. Dwivedi instructed the District Magistrates to explore more clusters and complete the process of micro planning and mapping of resources by January. All the activities as per micro plan for these new sites shall be taken up during January to June 2023, so that the area expansion plan for agriculture and allied activities can be executed in 2023-24.
The DMs were directed to take initiative for maintaining the assets created in phase I and prepare micro plans for optimal use of the water resource which has been made available in phase I. He also issued instructions for immediate rollout of irrigation intervention by Water Resources Investigation and Development Department (WRIDD).
In phase I, 5314 sites covering 24340 acres land was taken up, in phase II, 141 sites covering 10,471 acres were involved. In the ongoing phase III, 69 sites spread across 3,826 acres have been already covered and over 50,000 farmers till date have reaped benefits of the scheme. It was announced by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in May 2020 has been taken up in the six western districts — Bankura, West Midnapore, Jhargram, West Burdwan, Purulia and Birbhum.
The scheme involves various departments like Horticulture, Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and WRIDD converging with the aim to commercially exploit fallow land through horticulture, fisheries, animal husbandry for additional income generation of the farmers and economic upliftment of the rural folk through community participation along with environmental benefits mainly in the dry regions. The Chief Secretary further directed to speed up the process of FPO formation with the target of forming 179 of them by mid February. Till December 2022, the number of FPOs stood at 75. He also directed to increase application sanction of AIF in districts like Malda, Cooch Behar, Murshidabad etc.
