Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Shri Radha Mohan Singh inaugurated the Golden Jubilee of Green Revolution celebration on Saturday in Delhi and said that it is a proud moment for Indian agriculture when we have assembled here to commemorate the advent of Green Revolution in India.
Minister said that after the green revolution years today once again Indian agriculture is on cross roads with new challenges of development. Our major challenges are depletion and degradation of natural resources, drop in the water table, reduction in flow of water in rivers, lakes, biotic and abiotic stresses, climatic change etc.
It is time for second green revolution in the country and we believe that this can happen from the eastern states of our country. We have already taken several initiatives in research and development to achieve this goal. ICAR has launched Mera Gaon Mera Gaurav and Farmer FIRST wherein our agricultural scientists will adopt the villages and will directly interface with the farmers to solve their problems, he underlined.
The government has already launched Bringing Green Revolution to Eastern India (BGREI) for seven eastern states and in the last two years Rs. 1000 crores have been allocated for further strengthening it. The government has also launched Paramparagat Krishi Yojna, Soil Health Card Scheme, Pradhanmantri Krishi Sichai Yojna, Chaman for horticultural development, National Agri-tech Infrastructure Fund, Singh added.
It is generally believe that the benefits of green revolution were confined to areas with better natural endowments and the rainfed areas could not benefit as much. The rainfed areas today contribute about 60% to the agricultural production. Therefore, we need to focus on water management and conservation in these areas.
