ANANTNAG: The District Development Commissioner (DDC) Anantnag, Dr Basharat Qayoom today reviewed the status of Animal and Sheep Husbandry in the district.
Interacting with the officials, the DC said that several rural families are still dependent on cattle and dairy farming. He said that with adoption of scientific techniques, production has increased manifold and disease among the livestock has also been controlled.
The DC said that interventions are required to attract more people to engage in dairy/ sheep farming so that they can benefit from various Govt schemes that are incentivizing setting up of enterprises in this sector. He said the sector has vast potential for sustainable livelihood generation.
While apprising the DDC about the functioning of the department, CAHO Anantnag said that district has a cattle population of 1.53 lacs with milk production of 9.5 kg/day/ cow and a daily production of 6,43,872 litres. 35 percent of the households in the district are associated with this industry.
In order to provide the financial and technical support to the people engaged with this sector, various schemes like IDDS, IPDP, KCC, NLM, Live stock insurance, NADCP, etc are being run in the district, said the CAHO. Through these schemes financial assistance is being provided to the farmers to boost this sector.
Similarly, DSHO apprised the DC that various schemes including ISDS, KCC etc are functional in the district. He informed the chair that the sheep and goat population in the district is about 2.73 lacs with an annual production of 4.77 lac kgs of wool.
He said that with financial incentives through ISDS, 75 sheep units have been established in the district. He said that even though nearly 14 lakh kgs of meat is produced in the district, the supply falls short of demand, presenting an opportunity for setting up more sheep units.
The DC also took stock of the precautionary measures and regular surveillance that is being undertaken in the district to check the spread of Lumpy Skin Disease and directed the CAHO to ensure that all possible steps are taken to prevent spread of disease. He said that any reported cases should be immediately isolated.
The meeting was attended by ADDC, JD Planning, CAHO, DSHO among others.