JK News Today
Jammu, April 27: Drawing massive response from the farming community across all the districts in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir, more than 24000 farmers attended the orientation programme under Kisan Sampark Abhiyan during the first 3-day session across 264 venues of the Union Territory.
This programme is the brainchild of Financial Commissioner (Additional Chief Secretary) agriculture department Atul Dulloo.
A first of its kind massive farmer’s orientation exercise is being undertaken by Agriculture Production department in the UT of J&K whereby ambitious targets of reaching out to each and every farmer in each and every Panchayat of the UT has been envisaged under the Kisan Sampark Abhiyan in next four month.
The exercise commenced from 24th April and is going to conclude on 31st August 2023. The farmers outreach exercise has been planned under the recently launched Holistic Agriculture Development Programme (HADP).
The Orientation programme is being organised simultaneously across all the districts of the UT. The programme has been designed to be conducted on first three days of every week. An exhaustive District specific Calendar has been issued by the Government. The Resource persons for the orientations are Officers and Officials drawn from the Agriculture, Animal/Sheep Husbandry, Horticulture, Sericulture and Fisheries Departments, who were trained beforehand during the 641 training sessions which were held across all districts during the months of January to April. An innovative tool of describing the different schemes/ programmes using short films has been put in place. A total of 49 videos of schemes under HADP and other Centrally sponsored schemes will be shown to the farmers across the venues in J&K.
Using audio visual aids in describing the schemes had a lasting and much more engaging, engrossing effect on the farmers. Besides this question answer session after each screening session of videos was held to clear the doubt of farmers. The farmers were also provided with pamphlets of all the schemes in the three languages (Hindi, Urdu and English) which also contained the information about the contact details of all the departments under the agriculture production department of the UT.
Farmers were also informed about the mode of application under these schemes using the KISAN SATHI- the IT Dashboard of the schemes developed by APD. A simple scan of the QR codes on the pamphlets takes the farmer to the KISAN SATHI Portal where he can register easily and there is no need for visiting any office for applying under any of the schemes.
Farmers were also apprised about the DAKSH KISAN- a Learning Management System (LMS) for skill development of the farmers. A first of its kind in the country, DAKSH KISAN, has been developed by Agriculture Production Department, where 118 skilling courses as per the agro-climatic zones of the J&K UT are available for free to the farmers. Again, a simple scan of the QR code at the back of pamphlet takes the farmer to DAKSH KISAN Portal where he can register for free and undertake any skilling course of his/her liking.
The video lectures under the LMS are available in Kashmiri, Urdu, Dogri and Hindi and Textual material is available in Hindi Urdu and English. Besides specialised modules on business development and financial management have also been included to ensure that the farmers are not merely trained but become a skilful entrepreneur.
The successful farmers who clear the course will be provided Certificates from SKUAST-Jammu and SKUAST-Kashmir.
