PM Modi unveils 109 high-yielding, climate-resilient crop varieties

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

PM Narendra Modi on Sunday released 109 high-yielding, climate-resilient and bio-fortified varieties of 61 crops at the India Agricultural Research Institute.

These included 34 field crops and 27 horticultural crops. An announcement in this regard had been made last month by the finance minister in the budget speech. Modi also interacted with the farmers and scientists discussing the importance of these new crop varieties and stressed on the significance of value addition in agriculture, according to a government statement.

He discussed the importance of millets and underlined how people are moving towards nutritious food. He also spoke about the benefits of natural farming and the increasing faith of the common man in organic farming and organic foods. The PM suggested that the krishi vigyan kendras (KVKs) should proactively inform farmers about the benefits of the new varieties being developed every month.

Among the field crops released were seeds of various cereals, including millets, forage crops, oilseeds, pulses, sugarcane, cotton and fibre. Among the horticultural crops, different varieties of fruits, vegetable crops, plantation crops, tuber crops, spices, flowers and medicinal crops were released.