Srinagar, May 13: In an attempt to provide marketing support to the vegetable growers in the Valley, the J&K State Agro Industries Development Corporation today launched a scheme for the sale of fresh vegetables.
 Minister for Agriculture, Ghulam Hassan Mir flagged off the mobile vans at Lal Mandi, here, to dispatch vegetables to the different colonies for sale.
 Managing Director JK Agro Industries, Aslam Liagroo, senior officers of the corporation and growers were also present.
 Speaking on the occasion the Minister said the main aim for launching this activity is to provide an opportunity to the vegetable growers to reap the rewards for their hard work.
 “Our farmers are working very hard in their fields and are producing good quantity of vegetables every year but unfortunately because of the lack of proper channel and marketing support they are made to sell their vegetables at much reduced rates by the middlemen. In this way our growers are facing tremendous loss and the real benefits of their hard labour are taken away by the middlemen,” he said.
  “This sale scheme is an attempt to help the grower to get reasonable rates for their producers.  The basic mandate of the Agro industry is to do the proper marketing of the agricultural produce in the Valley hence it has taken an initiative to collect the fresh vegetables from the growers by paying them reasonable prices. These vegetables will then be sold by the corporation in different colonies of Srinagar at lower rates,” he added.
 The Minister said the corporation has begun by collecting the vegetables for the growers of Narkur Village of Budgam District who have produced bumper crop this year. “We are also planning to collect vegetables from the farmers of Marlu and Mujgund areas in the next phase,” he said.
 According to the Minister the corporation has made this effort to benefit the growers and consumers simultaneously.
 In the first phase the corporation has decided to make the vegetables available to the people living in areas like Housing Colony Peer Bagh, Sanat Nagar, Airport Road, Barzallah and Bank colony. “This will help the colony people to buy the vegetables at their door step the facility which they were lacking. Mobile vans will carry these vegetables to these colonies for sales and distribution. This is just a beginning.  We have started this scheme as a pilot project and if it goes well we will expand it further,” he said.
  “We will also be supplying the vegetables to Army and police as they consume a large quantity of vegetables,” he added.
 The Minister said that there is a lot of potential for employment generation in the agriculture sector and if this sector does not grow properly it will be very difficult to solve the problem of unemployment in the valley.
 The minister informed that they are also planning to establish proper cold storage facilities for the vegetable growers of the Valley to improve the shelf life of the produce.
  “We want that the agricultural land should be used properly to improve our production and to make the valley self sufficient in vegetables. The growers should work hard to improve their produce and we are here to provide the required market to them,” he added.

Lastupdate on : Thu, 13 May 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Thu, 13 May 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Fri, 14 May 2010 00:00:00 IST