Q: With reference to ‘Initiative for Nutritional Security through Intensive Millets Promotion’, which of the following statements is/are correct?
a) This initiative aims to demonstrate the improved production and post-harvest technologies, and to demonstrate value addition techniques, in an integrated manner, with cluster approach.
b) Poor, small, marginal and tribal farmers have larger stake in this scheme.
c) An important objective of the scheme is to encourage farmers of commercial crops to shift to millet cultivation by offering them free kits of critical inputs of nutrients and micro irrigation equipment.
The correct answer is 1 and 2 only.
Initiative for Nutritional Security through Intensive Millet Promotion (INSIMP)
- It was launched by the central government in 2011-12 to promote millets as “Nutri-cereals”.
- It intends to demonstrate improved production and post-harvest technologies in an integrated manner with visible impact in order to spark higher millet production in the country. Hence statement 1 is correct.
- Technology demonstration kits containing vital nutrients and plant protection measures, including micro-nutrients (but not micro-irrigation equipment), fungicides and bio-fertilizers, DAP, urea, potash, and pesticides including weedicides, will be provided to all farmers in the units at a cost of Rs. 3,000/- per ha for sorghum, pearl millet, and finger millet and Rs. 2,000/- per ha for small millets. Equipment for micro-irrigation is not included. Hence statement 3 is not correct.
- These kits would be supplied free of cost to the beneficiary farmers subject to the maximum area of 2 hectares.
- Certain districts with large crop areas under millets but with productivity less than that of the National Average Yield could be taken up for the active promotion of production technologies through block demonstrations.
- For small millets, which have low productivity in general and are harvested by resource-poor tribal farmers in distant interior areas, production programmes would be developed in all selected districts, regardless of productivity levels. Hence statement 2 is correct.
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