‘Agriculture farms need paradigm shift’

LAHORE : Punjab Agriculture Secretary Muhammad Mahmood has said that the agricultural farms managed by the adoptive research wing of Agriculture Department need a paradigm shift.

Muhammad Mahmood has started his visit to check improvement in the government agricultural farms. He said that the government agricultural farms should be managed to reflect them as model for the rest of the farming community so they could learn about the latest production technology/techniques from there. The Punjab agriculture secretary had issued instructions for transformation of the agricultural farms last year. Now he had started visiting them to evaluable the compliance with his directions.

The agriculture secretary directed the officials concerned to cultivate high value crops on the farms. He said that the government agricultural farms comprised thousands of acres of land in Punjab.

It is need of time to manage the farms with an aim to improve living standard of the people through increased farm income, he added. He directed the officials to use latest irrigation system at the farms so that water efficiency could be enhanced. He directed them to cultivate the fruits and vegetables whose demand was rapidly increasing worldwide.

He directed them to level the agricultural land under the government farms with laser land leveller. The agriculture secretary also directed the staff to cultivate crops according to climate zone and keeping in view

profitability of the farming community. For this purpose, agricultural farms has to be prepared, and there should be projects focusing on the development of climate-resilient varieties of crop, he added. He directed the field staff to keep close liaison with the farming community so that their problem could be addressed. He also warned that the officer/officials who did not follow the directions would be taken to task. Mahmood said that Agriculture Department’s mission was to serve the farming community.