Fertilizer subsidy programme in full swing

by Chamikara Weerasinghe

The Government's fertilizer programme will be in full swing within the coming days.

Minister of Agriculture, Environment, Irrigation and Mahaweli Development, Maithripala Sirisena said arrangement had been made to introduce the programme with full force with all deficiencies to be attended to in the next few days.

The Minister was speaking at a press conference yesterday at the Mahaweli Development Ministry. The farmers will be enabled to buy a 50 kg bag of fertilizer at Rs. 350 under the programme, as against its current price in the market Rs. 1,050.

This is expected to benefit 1,000,000 farmer families satisfying some 12,000 registered farmer organisations. The Government promised to give this fertilizer subsidy to farmers during its Presidential election campaigning through Mahinda Chinthana.

The Treasury had already imparted Rs. 200 million to Agrarian Services Department to begin distribution of fertilizer among the farmers, said Minister Sirisena.

"We admit there had been abrupt delays on our part due to various reasons to impart this fertilizer subsidy. We knew that we will have to face criticism at early stages," he said.

"The farmers can now obtain their fertilizer bags through the Agrarian Services Department, Farmer Co-operatives and government registered fertilizer retail outlets, after filling a form which is issued for this purpose by the Government for the programme's managerial purposes," he said.

Minister Sirisena said two government fertilizer companies had already begun distributing fertilizer bags on credit for farmers under the programme.

The Minister also said he had received complaints from various places that the forms issued by the Government to be filled by farmers to obtain their fertilizer requirements, too have been sold to them by some farmer organisations.

"They had sold these forms to the farmers saying that the money was charged as membership fee to the farmer organisation and other things," he said.

The Minister said this was illegal and he would take disciplinary action against any officer or individual who will be found selling these forms to the farmers.

He said the Government had given this subsidy to farmers to boost the national produce. As pointed out by him the fertilizer subsidy was to be considered a national investment in keeping with President Mahinda Rajapakse's plans to develop the country's agriculture sector.