Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa, who presented the Budget wearing a green shawl on Thursday, proposed to bring about a new agricultural policy to revive the economy.
The proposed policy, among other things, will prescribe measures to encourage water security, concepts of land bank and mass cultivation, besides micro-irrigation, processing of farm produce, and marketing. The larger intention is to provide the status of industry to agriculture and horticulture, notes the Budget. The State is also set to announce another policy which will prescribe crops suitable for specific regions based on recommendation by the Land Resources Registry, availability of water, and soil health.
Repeating an earlier announcement, the Chief Minister proposed to waive interest on default farm loans obtained from cooperative bodies for purchase of farm equipment. He also proposed to provide an interest exemption to the extent of 5% on loans taken by arecanut growers up to a maximum loan amount of ₹2 lakh availed of from cooperative bodies.
Karnataka being a State that has large tracts of drought-prone land, the Budget announced World Bank-funded new multi-State watershed area development project (REWARD) for the next six years to assist farming on 10 lakh hectares of land. Jalamrutha project will be implemented in 810 small watersheds, covering four lakh hectares in the next three years.
To take services to farmers’ doorstep, it has been proposed to launch “mobile agricultural health clinics” for soil and water testing besides providing various technical information relating to insecticides and diseases. However, there is no mention of size of the scheme and financial allocation.
To address the issue of post-harvest losses in the horticulture sector, the Budget has proposed to establish 10 cold storage units with a capacity of 5,000 tonnes each under public-private partnership in the APMC yards at a cost of ₹75 crore.
It has also proposed to strengthen HOPCOMS besides utilising the Krishi Rail scheme of the Centre to transport flowers and horticultural produce from Bengaluru to Delhi, Mumbai, and Thiruvananthapuram.
The cultivation of teff, chia, and quinoa too has been brought under the ‘Raitha Siri’ scheme under which incentive will be provided for cultivation of drought-resistant varieties such as minor millets. Similarly, ₹200 crore has been earmarked for encouraging organic farming.