Agartala, Apr 20, 2023, TRIPURA TIMES Desk
Agartala, April 20: Aiming to the adequate demand, the Tripura government is mulling for cultivation of red palm oil and establish its processing centre here in the state of Tripura after Mizoram, said agriculture minister Ratan Lal Nath on Thursday.
During his visit to the state-run horticulture research complex at Nagicherra here in the outskirts of Agartala on Thursday, the minister said, “Presently we need to import red palm oil from countries like Malaysia. But, once we can grow adequate plantations for red palm oil, we can export it to the foreign countries to meet its demand.”
He said, “Government is also planning to establish Horti-Eco Tourism here for strengthening farmers’ economy. The department had already started preparing a detailed project report for the proposed tourism initiative.”
Minister Ratan Lal Nath pitched for agro-based industries and said, “43 % of the gross state domestic product (GSDP) came from agriculture. We have developed a lot in the service and tertiary sectors but if we do industries, it must be agriculture-based or else we cannot be successful.”
“We could not achieve complete self-sufficiency in agriculture yet, but we are putting utmost effort on this and we are also to ensure doubling up the farmers’ income. There is a need to motivate farmers towards cultivation in a minimum land like we can easily grow black peppers with other plantations together, which needs no separate land,” he said, adding that the state agriculture experts recently visited Vietnam which is developed in agriculture technology to learn the techniques of farming with its different aspects and implement it here in the state.
Nath on Thursday also attended a master training programme on black pepper here in the conference hall of Nagicherra and stressed on the need of enhancing cultivation of spices in the state of Tripura. He said that Tripura presently grows some variety of spices like ginger, turmeric and others.
He said, “602 MT ginger was exported to foreign countries in the last five years, which brought an adequate economy to our state. It has been studied that growing ginger-like spices are more beneficial in terms of generating income than that of growing paddy, although there is also a need to grow paddy.”
“At a time when the state of Tripura had potential to grow variety of spices, it does have huge market in the foreign countries,” he said, adding that the farmers need to be motivated towards growing spices so as to enhance their income.