Raghbir Singh Brar
Faridkot
Chief agriculture officer of the district has appealed to the farmers not to grow banned paddy varieties,including Pusa 44, Pila Pusa and other Hybrid varieties as those have been banned by the state government.
“I appeal to the farmers that they should not grow banned rice varieties on the fields because they take too much time to mature. The farmers have already been advised by the state government not to grow these banned varieties and have encouraged the farmers to choose any PR variety,mainly PRR 126,which saves a lot of water,requires less fertilizers and chemicals and matures very shortly,” said Dr Kulwant Singh,CAO Faridkot.
PR 126,which was very popular among the farmers, led to a stalled procurement by the rice millers claiming that it had less out turn ratio,which was rejected by the government on the basis of the physical trials.
This season, while the government had banned the long duration varieties, the commission agents and rice millers,who also have commission agents business,indirectly encouraged the farmers to either sow Pusa 44, or Pila Pusa and Dogar Pusa apart from some hybrid varieties.
The CAO said that long duration varieties leave too much stubble while the PR varieties have much less stubble which leads to the easy sowing of wheat.Now it would have to be yet to be seen which Punjab government goes while purchasing these varieties,discouraging them or accepting them.
