CHENNAI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday presented Krishi Karman Award for 2015-16 to Tamil Nadu for its record production of foodgrain, which include paddy, pulses and millets, during the inaugural function of Krishi Unnati Mela in New Delhi.
On behalf of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami, Agriculture Minister R Doraikkannu, Agriculture Secretary Gagandeep Singh Bedi and Director of Agriculture V Dakshinamoorthy received the prestigious award from the Prime Minister. The award carries a trophy, citation and Rs 5 crore.
Besides, two progressive farmers R Rasathi of Ariyalur district and S Samynathan of Tirunelveli district from Tamil Nadu were presented an award of Rs 2 lakh each along with citation for obtaining paddy yield of 9,563 kg per hectare and pulses (black gram) yield of 1,700 kg per hectare during 2015-16.
Tamil Nadu government has launched Foodgrain Mission during 2012-13 to bring in a paradigm shift from food security to food surplus through a Mission Mode Approach to bridge the yield gap.
For this, it has introduced frontier technologies and policy initiatives to achieve a quantum jump in foodgrain production. Due to such efforts, foodgrain production, which was 75.95 lakh tonnes in 2010-11, touched an all-time high achievement of 101.52 lakh tonnes in 2011-12 and Tamil Nadu received Krishi Karman award for foodgrain production for 2011-12.
Tamil Nadu continued its efforts in achieving higher production and productivity and programmed to sustain this position at all-India level in subsequent years.
Due to this initiative, the State has been recognised with the Krishi Karman Award a second time for the best performance in pulses production with 6.14 lakh tonnes of yield in 2013-2014, and Krishi Karman Award for best performance in coarse cereals of 40.79 lakh tonnes in the year 2014-2015.