Bhubaneswar: Odisha government Monday decided to distribute ragi at the rate of Rupee 1 per kg among public distribution system (PDS) cardholders in the state.
This was decided at the Odisha Millet Mission meeting held under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary A P Padhi.The chief secretary directed officials to pilot the ragi distribution in seven poverty-stricken districts – Gajpati, Kalahandi, Kandhamal, Koraput, Malkangiri, Nuapada and Rayagada – in the month of July. The card holders in Malkangiri will be supplied two kilogram of ragi in July. Agriculture Secretary Sourav Garg said: “Around 17,500 quintals of ragi would be distributed to the card-holders in the month of July.”
He said the future of the programme will depend on the acceptability of the people and the impact of the pilot. The meeting also resolved to procure around one lakh quintals of ragi from the farmers in coming kharif season at minimum support price of Rs 2897.00 per quintal.
“The prime objective of government intervention is to fetch good market price to the ragi farmers and to prohibit any distress sale”, Padhi said. Muthukumar, Director Agriculture said during the Kharif season of 2018, a total number of 24,499 farmers were registered and verified for procurement of ragi.
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