Odisha releases Rs 365 crore for rain hit farmers in 19 dists

Odisha government today released Rs 364.76 crore from the state disaster relief fund (SDRF) to be distributed as agriculture input subsidy among farmers who sustained crop loss due to unseasonal rain during the third week of November.
As many as 4.07 lakh hectares of agricultural land in 14720 villages under 2460 gram panchayats of 133 blocks and 257 wards of 38 urban local bodies spread over 19 districts were affected by unseasonal rain, an officer at the Special Relief Commissioner's (SRC) office said.
The farmers in the districts of Balasore, Bhadrak, Boudh, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Gajapati, Ganjam, Jagatsingpur, Jajpur, Kandhamal, Kendrapada, Keonjhar, Khordha, Koraput, Mayurbhanj, Nabarangpur, Nayagarh, Puri and Rayagada suffered crop damage due to cyclonic depression induced unseasonal rain.

The farmers whose agriculture/horticulture crops are affected to the extent of 33 per cent or above will get agriculture input subsidy at the rate Rs 6,800 per hectare in case of rainfed areas and Rs 13,500 in case of areas under assured irrigation, said SRC B P Sethi adding that the farmers would get input subsidy for maximum two hectares.
Earlier, the Odisha farmers had suffered huge crop loss to drought and brown plant hopper (BPH) pest attack on paddy.
While the drought severely affected crop in 3.17 lakh hectares of land in 15 districts, over 1.28 lakh hectares of paddy crop was damaged due to pest attack in 24 districts.

The state government had announced packages in two phases Rs 216 crore for drought and Rs 137 crore for pest attack from SDRF.