MARGAO
January 8, 2020 saw a revolution in the making at the Durga agriculture farm in Chinchinim village, thanks to the initiative of the Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) to revive farming at the farm after a gap of over four decades.
Reason: It was on that day that the process was set in motion to bring around six out of the 30 hectares of the agricultural farm under paddy cultivation at the initiative of Sanjeev Mayenkar, then district agricultural officer, holding additional charge of Krishi Vigyan Kendra, South Goa. The initiative not only brought the fallow paddy fields inside the spacious farm to cultivation, but the government harvested a bumper paddy field that year.
Two years down the lane, cultivation of paddy at the Durga farm has now been reduced to just 3,000 square metres as against hectares of paddy cultivated in 2020. When Agriculture Department has been making appeals to the farmers across the State not to leave the agricultural fields, local residents have flayed the agriculture officials for not cultivating the entire farm area this year.
In fact, the locals demanded that the Agriculture Department should lease out the farm to the residents, especially the youth, who are ready to enter the fields to eke a living and protect nature.
Environmentalist and Chinchinim panchayat member representing Durga, Gerson Gomes lamented that the Agriculture Department has left the farm fallow by cultivating just around 3,000 square metre fields this year. “If the government cannot cultivate the fields, they should give the fields on lease to the unemployed. Our boys are ready to work in the fields if they lease us the same,” he said.
Gerson pointed out that around four hectares of fields in the Durga farm was brought under cultivation during Mayenkar’s tenure. “It is sad that the Agriculture Department has cultivated just 3,000 square metres of fields this season,” he said.
He added: “We have been told that the department has no labourers to work at the farm. They have also taken the plea that the Durga farm is facing the issue of salinity and stray cattle. I would like to ask the government when the Agriculture Department is giving subsidies across the State for fencing, why can’t the government protect its own farm from the cattle. If they have issues over salinity, the breached bunds should be plugged by repairing the sluice gates.”
Pointing out that labourers appointed by the Agriculture Department are working in the offices instead on the ground, he demanded that the labourers should be deployed as per their appointment letters.
An elderly resident Jose Sebastiao said the salinity can be effectively checked if the bunds are repaired and plugged after the rains. “This will stop the saline water from entering the fields,” he added.
Another resident Anthony Fernandes echoed similar sentiments. He said the Agriculture Department should take the expertise from the locals, whose parents have been cultivating the fields before the government took over the farm in the early 60’s.”
