Kalam predicts Paliganj to be center of next Green Revolution

Paliganj (Patna), May 3 (PTI) The hub of the second Green Revolution of the country would be at Paliganj in Bihar with the farmers “immensely contributing” towards achieving a revolution in foodgrain productivity, former President A P J Abdul Kalam said today. “You all started with 2.4 hectare of land in 1999 and extended it to 2000 hectare by 2004 and during this period, using sound agricultultural policies, quality seeds and input material, you have been able to demonstrate that the productivity of rice and wheat can be more than doubled in the five years time”, Kalam said while addressing farmers at Paliganj, about 55 km from here, this morning. He said this trend undertaken by Paliganj farmers should continue and there was a need for making Bihar the granary of India. Referring to Bihar, Kalam said the net area under cultivation of grains was around 56 lakh hectare and the average yields of rice and wheat in this area was 1.45 and 2.19 tonne per hectare respectively. “The Paliganj farmer have proved beyond doubt that they can produce at least four tonnes per hectare of paddy and six tonnes per hectare of wheat”, he said. “It it time that the agriculture univesities like Rajendra Agriculture University and other universities in the state work in partnership with farmers of Paliganj and the district development officers of all the 38 districts, so that we can achieve the goal of doubling the productivity of wheat and paddy within the next five years,” he suggested. He said the Paliganj farmers should also work in enhancing the productivity during 2016-2020 as this effort would make Paliganj “the hub” of propagating second Green Revolution. The former President said India has to now embark upon the second Green Revolution which would enable it to increase the foodgrain production from the existing 230 million tonnes per year to at least 340 million tonnes per year by 2020. The former president said the increase in production would have to overcome many impeding factors and the requirement of land for the increasing population as well as for greater afforestation and environmental preservation activities would force a situation whereby the preset 170 million hectare of arable land would not not be fully available. More PTI AJK MM