Archives

Trincomalee correspondent

The Department of Agriculture in collaboration with the Department of Irrigation has launched a programme named Granary area programme in high potential areas in Trincomalee. The objectives of this programme are to improve efficiency and productivity of water use in paddy production in selected high potential areas in terms of cropping intensity and unit of water, to improve reliability of irrigation water supply, and to build the required institutional capacity at micro level to support irrigation and other interventions.

The role of the Irrigation Department will be scientific planning, allocation, delivery and application of water leading to increase cropping intensity and expected yield level in declared areas, to ensure equity and timeliness in water allocation and applications, to ensure the seed production farms are allocated with adequate water, to ensure the participation of farmers organisations and overall implementation of the irrigation interventions of the granary area programme with the support of the partner institutions.

Under this programme 25% of the paddy lands under Kantale and Allai schemes will be cultivated to obtain a higher yield. Agriculture Department has introduced short maturing varieties of paddy with higher yield potential than the long maturing varieties.

These varieties have given relatively higher yields even in the farmers' fields and the department now recommends these varieties for both Yala an Maha in most irrigation schemes.

In general, total period required for a particular plant to mature would be less in the warmer areas relative to the cooler areas and vise versa when other environmental conditions remain same. For rice plants this can vary from days to weeks depending on the temperature. For instance rice plants will mature in a lesser period than nominal growth period in warmer areas while the same variety will take a longer period in cooler areas.

In Trincomalee district out of the 14,655ha of land under the Kantale and Allai irrigation schemes 3,600ha will be brought under cultivation under the Granary Area Programme during the coming Maha season.

In addition this programme is to be carried out in the districts of Ampara (12,325ha of land), Moneragala (675ha of land), Polonnaruwa (8150ha of land), Kandy/Matale (1880ha of land) and Badulla (495ha of land).

www.crescat.com

News | Business | Features | Editorial | Security
Politics | World | Letters | Sports | Obituaries

Produced by Lake House
Copyright © 2003 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
Comments and suggestions to :Web Manager