Staff Reporter
SHILLONG:
A government official on January 5 said that under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), the government has not just consistently increased funds utilisation and expenditure over the years but has also utilised it to build quality assets and reach out to the neediest among the rural population.
He said that during the financial year 2018-2022 the expenditure was Rs 4,500 crore while in preceding four years it was merely Rs 2,500 crore.
“This led to more than Rs 16,600 annual amount transferred on an average to every household, while in the last government it was around Rs 9,000,” the official said.
He also said that being an agrarian state, the farmers are the backbone of the state’s economy but there was no scheme introduced to solve the problems the farmers face every day.
“We introduced the largest farmer’s welfare scheme of the state – FOCUS- Farmers’ Collectivization for Upscaling Production and Marketing Systems,” he said.
He further said that Rs 5,000 unconditional grant to every household has been transferred to producer group accounts to undertake agriculture related activities.
More than 2.7 lakhs farmers have been benefited through the programme through over 20,000 Producer Groups.
The official said that encouraged by the success of FOCUS, FOCUS+ scheme was conceptualised to facilitate the farmers directly by transferring an additional grant amount of Rs. 5,000 to their individual bank accounts.
Along with the grants, an elaborate system has been created where farmers are supported from inputs, training on better farming practices to marketing and logistic support.
“Superior quality seeds and package of practices on various farming techniques has also been provided to the farmers,” the official said.
He further said that to enable cluster/village-level aggregation and facilitate bargaining power of the farmer’s products, processing, marketing and storage, 185 Collective Marketing Centers have been set up all across the state.
Many of Meghalaya’s products like the Lakadong turmeric, ginger, pineapple, pepper are globally known for their quality. Added to that, produce like honey, milk, pork are of high demand in the state which is generally imported from other states.
The official also informed that the mission mode projects such as Lakadong Mission has been a tremendous success.
According to him till 2019, only 1,000 farmers were engaged in Lakadong cultivation.
“Through the mission, we have been successful in engaging more than 13,000 farmers. The production has also increased from 7,000 metric tonnes to 11,832 metric tonnes,” the official said.
“We are also providing a high-yielding variety of piglets and Kuroiler birds to our farmers through the PROGRESS scheme. A total budget of Rs 40 crore for piglets and Rs 1 crore for poultry birds are being distributed. Three female and one male high yielding piglets are being distributed to more than 16,000 beneficiaries,” the official informed.
The government official also said that one of the priorities of the Meghalaya Democratic Alliance government was to care, support and empower the women of the state.
“Through Self Help Group (SHG) movement supported by the National Rural Livelihood Mission, the lives of more than four lakhs women and their families have been transformed. Currently 36,000 newly formed SHGs are operational, these were merely 5,800 in 2018,” he said.