Three colleges to be set up under Bihar Agriculture University

Representation pic

The Bihar government has said that three agriculture colleges will be set up in the state to boost the development of the farm sector. Three colleges - Agriculture Business Management College at Patna, Agriculture Engineering College and Community Science/Food Technology College at Gaya and Biotechnology College at Ara will be set up, Agriculture Minister Prem Kumar said in the Assembly yesterday.

"These institutes will be set up in the state under the Bihar Agriculture University as enshrined in the third Agriculture Road Map (2017-22) which was launched in November 2017 to boost the all round development of the farm sector," Kumar said. A scholarship scheme will also be launched at the post-graduate level to prepare trained manpower for the development of agriculture education and research in the state, Kumar said.

Kumar made the statements while giving reply after the conclusion of the debate in the state Assembly on his department's Rs 2749.77 crore budget demand for 2018-19. The House later passed the budget with voice vote amid boycott by the RJD and the Congress members expressing dissatisfaction over the minister's reply.

The Agriculture Road Map was first implemented in 2008 which was again implemented for a period of five years in 2012, the minister said and added that "the third Agriculture Roadmap of Rs 1.54 lakh crore was launched by President Ramn Nath Kovind on November 9, 2017 for another five year term from 2017-2022. The year 2017 has been the year of achievements for agriculture sector, he said adding that the state witnessed a record food grains production of 185.6 lakh tonne.

Besides, the state has witnessed record maize production of 38 lakh tonne in 2017, he said and added the state was chosen for Centre's Krishi Karman Award for record maize production. The award will be given by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 17, 2018, he said. With a view to providing benefits of government's schemes meant to farmers at their door steps, the minister said the government had decided to open 'agriculture offices' at panchayat level instead of at block levels from next fiscal.

Telemetric weather stations at block level will be set up to provide timely information to farmers about weather, rain, humidity among others, he said adding that rain measurement unit would be set up at the panchayat level. These stations will be set up in five districts- East Champaran, Supaul, Nalanda, Gaya and Arwal- at pilot project in 2017-18 and will be expanded in all the districts in next phase. In order to promote organic farming, the government has decided to carry out organic farming on 25,000 acres of land in villages situated along the national highway in the next fiscal, the minister said.

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