Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Saturday emphasized on increasing private investment in the farm sector to boost growth. The minister said this while addressing an international webinar organised by Chaudhary Charan Singh University, Meerut and a national webinar by Junagadh Agricultural University.

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Tomar said the increase in private investment will increase prosperity in the agriculture sector, which in turn will increase self reliance and prosperity in the country, according to an official statement.

He called upon scientists to contribute in increasing agricultural production and mitigate difficulties.
In the webinar organised by Meerut University, Tomar said India is not only self-sufficient but has surplus foodgrains production.

To meet the demand for growing population, the minister said plant breeders and scientists in India are faced with the challenge of increasing production of foodgrains and providing enough nutritional food to all Indians.

He stressed on developing disease-resistant and pest-resistant varieties that require less area and can be grown in unfavourable conditions like dry climate, high temperature, saline and acidic soils.

Bio-fortification strategy must also be used to develop high quality crop varieties having high protein, iron, zinc etc nutritional content, he said.

Plant breeders should use the latest biotechnology methods in addition to traditional methods of farming.

The minister emphasised on soil health testing and appealed for creating awareness about this.

Tomar highlighted that the government is investing heavily to develop infrastructure in agriculture and allied sectors.

In the webinar organised by Junagadh Agricultural University, the Union Agriculture Minister stressed on achieving better farm production with less water.?

During coronavirus crisis, the minister said, farmers have harvested bumper winter crops and also increased the sowing of summer crops by 45 per cent.

Tomar said that no other government has provided so much fund for agriculture and farmers welfare as the Modi Government.

The allocation for the PM-Kisan scheme alone is more than the whole agriculture budget previously. He also stressed on linking more and more farmers to the 10,000 new Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), whose formation has been announced recently.