Team Herald

Panjim: Chief Minister Pramod Sawant has chalked out a strategy to reduce Goa’s dependency on neighbouring States to meet local demands for veggies, flowers and dairy. He urged citizens to take up farming as well as dairy production in a big way. The State government spends several crores of rupees on purchase of vegetables, fruits, flowers and milk from States like Karnataka.

“We spend nearly Rs 25 crore as subsidy only for buying vegetables from Karnataka. Why are we not growing these vegetables in Goa? This big amount can instead be spent on local growers and farmers,” he said while addressing an event of Goa Institute of Public Administration & Rural Development at Old Goa on Wednesday.

The CM further calculated that Rs 1.50 crore is spent daily on purchase of milk, large quantum of which is imported from other States while flowers worth Rs 40 lakh is brought to Goa daily.

“We can produce these flowers which are procured from other States. Similarly, to increase daily production, one can avail schemes by Department of Animal Husbandry & Veterinary. Our government has several schemes unlike other States,” he added. “We all have to plan a line of action for which, the government needs support from the people,” he stated further.

The CM also asked for strengthening of coordination among government departments to understand the requirements, in a bid to lessen dependence on other States.

The GIPARD had organized the valedictory function of two training programs for prison wardens and immersion study for CRPs, BRPs and NRLM scheme. The CM was thereafter shown the award winning architectural design for new GIPARD building and the newly set up IEC/Computer Laboratory at the institute.

The training calendar for the year 2020-21 as well as specially developed inhouse training modules was released by the CM.