Srikakulam: Procure 75,000 tonnes of paddy within a week, officials told

Srikakulam: Procure 75,000 metric tonnes (MT) of paddy from farmers within one week, District Collector Shrikesh B Lathkar told the officials here on Sunday.

He reviewed the paddy procurement with the officials of the Civil Supplies, Agriculture, Co-operative and Revenue departments along with Joint Collector M Vijaya Suneetha.

Speaking on the occasion, the Collector explained that so far only 4,300 MTs of paddy was procured from farmers through Rythu Bharosa Kendras (RBKs) and primary agricultural cooperative societies (PACS). "This is poor achievement with regard to paddy procurement and the process needs to be accelerated," he said.

He asked the officials to motivate the field-level staff to procure paddy from farmers at a quick pace to prevent entry of middlemen. "If we delay the procurement process, farmers automatically move towards the middlemen to dispose of their produce on quick pace," he said. To prevent such a scenario and to protect farmers from middlemen, the government departments should speed up the process by making all arrangements at paddy procurement centres, the Collector said. He said the staff can engage vehicles to transport the paddy from field to PPCs and also to the rice mills allotted and they can claim transport charges.

PACs governing bodies need to make sufficient arrangements for paddy procurement. If they cause any delay, the permission to procure paddy will be cancelled, he warned.