Aizawl, Nov 12 : The hilly Mizoram is expecting a significant increase in rice production this year, thanks to the new farming technology-- system of rice intensification.
The agriculture department has introduced the improved farming system in different low-lying areas of Mizoram.
It has been experienced that rice produce under SRI is double that of conventional farming system. Agriculture director Dr C Lalzarliana, witnessed harvesting of rice grown under the SRI method at North Vanlaiphai under Serchhip district recently, saw that with the new method the farmers produced approximately 2.5 to 3.0 metric tonnes of rice per hectare of land compared to 1.75 metric tonnes per hectare under conventional method.
The improved technology and mechanisation of rice harvesting gave enthusiasm to the farmers, agriculture officials said. The agriculture director also visited different projects of farming under the district, including vegetable waste compost and terracing under the RKVY scheme.
Agricultural film method is being used to store rain water. It has been experimented that wet rice cultivation can be done with rainwater alone.
The agriculture director informed the farmers that from next season his department would provide the farmers with pesticides and fertilizers. Slaked lime and fertilizers for the rabi season.
Owing to the government s boost on mechanisation of farming, officials in the state agriculture department said the area of jhum cultivation in Mizoram decreased by 36 per cent and that of wet rice cultivation increased by 28.4 % during last year.
While the area of shifting cultivation in 2010-2011 has decreased from 44,947 hectares to 28,562, the area of wet rice cultivation has increased from 9,446 hectares to 12,130 hectares, a source in the department said.
At present, Mizoram produces only 25 per cent of the total rice consumption.
Mizoram produces only 44,950 metric tonnes of rice, against the total consumption of 1,80,000 metric tonnes.
As the government declared bumper rice harvest year, more farmers took up wet rice cultivation.
The department targets to produce 52,000 MT of rice this year. It aims to increase rice produce per hectare of land in WRC from 1.6 MT to 2.5 MT and from 0.9 MT to 1.2 MT in jhum areas.
The Congress government s flagship programme, New Land Use Policy basically aims to do away with the age-old traditional shifting (jhum) cultivation by providing sustainable land-based occupation to the farmers.
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