VASCO
In a major boost for traditional farmers of Velsao, the agriculture department will take up trenches and a drainage system along the borders of the fields to prevent it from inundation.
Assistant Agriculture Officer Mahesh Kankonkar, who inspected the Velsao fields along with Pale Tole Xetkaranche Association (PTXA) President Roquezinho DSouza and other traditional farmers, said the work would be taken up as a pilot project.
“We had held an awareness camp at the Velsao Panchayat at the request of PTXA President Roquezinho D’Souza and we heard a lot of grievances of the framers during our interaction,” said Kankonkar.
“We were told that tractors and harvesters would get stuck in the fields and after we carried out an inspection, we realised that the excess rainwater and other water from nearby buildings would flow in the fields and not drain out, causing silt.”
“We are now planning to have drainage on all 4 sides of the fields to drain out water by finding the actual area of these fields and get a quotation and put this proposal as a pilot project under the community farming scheme,” said Kankonkar.
PTXA President Roquezinho D’Souza said the tractors and harvesters provided by Cortalim Farmers club got stuck in the silt last year and people were forced to manually clear the fields.
“We got an opportunity to raise our grievances during the awareness camp and this resulted in the inspection today by the Zonal Agriculture Office. We will submit all our documents to the ZAO for further process,”
said D’Souza.
“Cortalim MLA Anton Vas, who has always helped us with free tractors and harvesting machines, has also assured to follow up with the ZAO after this inspection so that the drainage works for Velsao fields is done immediately.”
