Hyderabad: In the year 2018-19, the Civil Supplies Department of Telangana Government achieved a great record by making highest procurement, beyond the expectations from farmers in Telangana history.
In Kharif and Rabi seasons it purchased 77.41 Lakh Metric Tons (LMTs) of paddy from 14.73 lakh farmers at Minimum Support Price (Grade-A – Quintal Rs. 1510, Common – Quintal Rs. 1470) and paid Rs. 13,673 crores in their accounts directly.
In this Kharif season Civil Supplies have purchased 40.41 lakh metric tons of paddy 8,08,885 farmers through 3297 Paddy purchase centers (PPCs) and in Rabi purchased 37 lakh metric tons of paddy from 6,63,723 farmers at 3509 PPCs.
Telangana is now at second place next after Punjab in the country. In Kharif and Rabi season Telangana state procured 77.41 LMTs paddy from 14,73,608 farmers at 6816 PPCs. In last year 2017-18 season 53.98 LMTs paddy was purchased. This year procurement is 23.43 LMTs more.
In 2014-15, the Civil Supplies Department purchased 24.28 LMTs from 3329 centers and paid Rs. 3390.50 Crores. It increased to 23.56 LMTs for Rs. 3,396.97 Cr in 2015-16; 53.69 LMTs for Rs. 8,089.56 Cr in 2016-17 and 53.98 LMTs from 6029 centers for Rs. 8565.15 Crores in 2017-18.
“With the implementation of farmer welfare schemes, mainly Rythu Bandhu, Rythu Bima, 24 Hours power supply and new irrigation projects taken up by Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, only this year, we were able to make procurement from the farmers without any difficulties at record level,” said Agriculture Minister S. Niranjan Reddy.
The minister said that with the cooperation of District Collectors, Joint Collectors, Civil Supplies Department, Corporation and other divisions, this year the Civil Supplies Department procured record amount of paddy.
“As assurance of getting Minimum Support Price (MSP) at government PPCs farmers showed more interest at these centers. We made all arrangements to make sure that farmers face no difficulty in selling paddy. Online Procurement Management System (OPMS) software was upgraded so that farmers get information about nearest PPCs by sending SMS to them,” he said.
“Newest state Telangana reaching second place in the country next to Punjab is a very big achievement and this whole credit will go to the Chief Minister,” the Minister said. (INN)