New Delhi (NVI): There has been a reduction of 12.01% in incidents of stubble burning this season compared to the same period in 2018 even as the Centre on November 5 said that it has initiated several measures to contain the problem.
Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) said, “The States of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab recorded a reduction of 48.2 %, 11.7% and 8.7% respectively, till November 4.”
“Total 31,402 burning events were detected in the three states between October 1 and November 3 which are distributed as 25366, 4414 and 1622 in Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh respectively,” it added.
The Union ministry for Agriculture & Farmers Welfare has adopted several measures to tackle stubble burning incidents, said an official statement, adding “as per directions PMO office in 2017, a high-level committee under Secretary (DARE) has been set up with regard to the pollution caused in Delhi-NCR due to stubble burning in neighbouring states.
According to the recommendations of the committee to adopt mechanized crop residue management, Agriculture and Farmers Ministry had formulated a scheme which was included in the 2018-19 Budget, said the statement.
The Central Sector Scheme, ‘Promotion of Agricultural Mechanization for In-Situ Management of Crop Residue in the State of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh & NCT of Delhi’ was launched with a total outgo of Rs.1151.80 crore for the period from 2018-19 to 2019-20 by the government to tackle air pollution and to subsidize machinery required for in-situ management of crop residue in the these states, it added.
“Within one year of its implementation utilizing an amount of Rs. 500 crore, the happy seeder and zero tillage technology were adopted in 8 lakh hectares of land in the North-Western States of India. Under the scheme, financial assistance at 50% of the cost is provided to the farmers for purchase of in-situ crop residue management machines on individual ownership basis. The financial assistance for the establishment of Custom Hiring Centres of in-situ crop residue management machinery is at 80% of the project cost,” it further added.
During 2019-20, the funds amounting to Rs. 273.80 crores, Rs.192.06 crores and Rs. 105.29 crores have released so far to the governments of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh respectively. With this financial assistance, 29,488 machines have been acquired. From these 10379 machines were directly given to farmers and 19109 machines were given to CHCs.
–ps
