Srinagar: Department is committed in pursuing the Prime Minister’s Vision of promoting zero budget natural farming, to make Agriculture sector economically vibrant and environmentally sustainable the organic farming coupled with natural farming could be a game changer, to promote the natural farming and to increase the scope for trade of organic produce on national as well as international level, the product has to be certified by an authentic agency, these views were expressed by Director Agriculture Kashmir Chowdhary Mohammad Iqbal while filing online for organic certification with Agriculture and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) for accreditation.
Speaking on the occasion Director Agriculture said that the change in the feeding habits and lifestyle globally has increased the demand for organically produced food and other agriculture commodities. We are having one of the best agro climatic conditions for the production of vegetables and other crops organically/naturally, therefore this potential has to be grabbed for the socio economic transformation of our farming community, he said and added.
Chowdhary Iqbal said that we have already started the process of getting the certification for our organically produced crops and once this process is completed it will open new windows for our produce in terms of national as well as international marketing platforms.
Director Agriculture asked the concerned Chief Agriculture Officers of concerned districts to identify new areas for the promotion of organic/ zero budget natural farming. Farm Managers of Departmental farms were also given instructions to prepare a roadmap for the promotion of natural farming so that the prime minister’s vision could be followed in letter and spirit.
Earlier, Director Agriculture visited Tahab Pulwama where he inspected the vertical farming intervention adopted by the farmers. During the interaction with the farmers technical guidelines were issued and every possible technical support from the Department was ensured to the farmers. Some farm machinery was also distributed among the farmers.
The Director was accompanied by Deputy Director Planning Mohammad Younis Chowdhary and other officers of the Department.

KR Desk