National Agricultural Policy to strengthen farmers

by Bharatha Malawalaarachchi and Ranil Wijayapala

A National Agricultural Policy will be formulated to boost the agriculture sector and strengthen the farmer community, Agriculture, Environment, Irrigation and Mahaweli Development Minister Maithripala Sirisena told Parliament yesterday.

He said this policy will be prepared in consultation with all stake holders to uplift the farming community and boost the national economy.

"It will be a policy suitable to the country's requirements. Views and opinions of farmers will be taken into account in preparing this policy," Sirisena said opening yesterday's second reading debate on the budget.

He stressed the country could be developed within an agriculture framework.

Sirisena said the Government has already declared 2006 as the year for promoting local food products.

"This has become necessary considering the situation in the local market which has been flooded with foreign food products. We have to change this and steps should be taken to promote the local food produce," the Minister said.

He said many foreign fruits are available in the local market, while the local production has been affected.

"This was not seen two decades ago. At the time, plenty of local fruits had been in the market. We have to promote local produce," he said.

The Minister stressed the necessity to cultivate all lands suitable for agriculture.

"We request all land owners to take measures to cultivate their lands suitable for agricultural purposes," he said.

Referring to criticism against the distribution of the fertiliser subsidy, Sirisena admitted that there are certain problems in this programme.

"Even before launching this programme, we predicted that there can be certain problems within the first two weeks. We have to accept this kind of problems when arrangements are being made to give a bag of fertiliser worth Rs. 1,650 at Rs. 350," the Minister said.

He said these problems are not due to fault of the distribution system.

"The distribution system and mechanism is a proper one. There is no problem there". He revealed that problems are due to Treasury allocations.

"We are now planning to meet Treasury officials and resolve these problems to ensure that farmers are given the fertiliser subsidy without any hardships," Sirisena said.