PUNJAB

Punjab Government has decided to provide grant-in-aid to the eligible NGOs for establishing or running the Senior Citizen Homes in 16 districts of the State.

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Fulfilling its commitment for the well being of all sections of the Society, the has made arrangements to establish and run Senior Citizen Homes in all the districts under The Punjab Management of Senior Citizen Homes for Elderly Persons Scheme 2019, said the state Social Security, Women and Child Development Minister Aruna Chaudhary.

The Minister said that a grant-in-aid worth Rs 3.84 crore was released to such NGOs in Amritsar, Ludhiana, and Ferozepur districts for the senior citizen homes during the previous financial year 2020-21. Now in this financial year, applications have been invited from NGOs for grant-in-aid for opening or running old age homes in the remaining 16 districts Bathinda, Fatehgarh Sahib, Faridkot, Fazilka, Gurdaspur, Pathankot, Jalandhar, Kapurthala, Sri Muktsar Sahib, Moga, Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar, Patiala, Rup Nagar, SAS Nagar, Sangrur, and Tarn Taran.

Free uniform for govt school kids

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School Education Minister Vijay Inder Singla has said 13,48,632 government school students will receive free uniform at their Home for the academic session 2021-22 as a grant of Rs 80.92 crore had been released by the Education Department.

He said after sanctioning the required grant, directions had been issued to district education officers for proper arrangement of uniform and have been asked to follow the safety protocol while distributing these among students. He added funds would be credited to the school management committees for the purchase of uniform.

Canada needs 30,000 new immigrants in agri sector: Report

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Canada needs 30,000 permanent immigrants over the next decade to either start up their own farms, or take over existing ones, to address a looming labour crisis in the Agriculture-notes-for-state-psc-exams”>Agriculture , says a new study.

According to a Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) research, 40 per cent of Canadian farm operators will retire by 2033, placing agriculture on the cusp of one of the biggest labour and Leadership transitions in the country’s HISTORY.

Over the same period, a shortfall of 24,000 general farm, nursery and greenhouse workers is expected to emerge, and in 10 years, 60 per cent of today’s farm operators will be over the age of 65, that is, close to retirement.

Canada’s agricultural sector is among the most diverse in the world though the degree of demand for foreign workers differs significantly by province and operation.

When it comes to more highly-skilled farm operators, Canada has always welcomed them from India, the Netherlands, China, the US and the UK.

Impure water in schools: NGT for action in Punjab

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Taking note of contamination of drinking water in 86 schools of Ludhiana district, the (NGT) has ordered the Punjab government to take remedial action to prevent Water Pollution.

The NGT directed the states chief secretary to coordinate with other departments concerned, ascertain causes of contamination and take remedial action in the interest of public Health. A meeting with departments concerned for the purpose may be held within a month and action taken as decided, says the NGT order.

World-class education in Punjab still a challenge

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During its election campaign, AAP had been claiming that it would turn government schools into world-class educational institutions. The party had given eight guarantees on the Education front to people. These included transforming the education system taking along teachers, regularising contractual job, change in the transfer policy, no non-TEACHING work for teachers, filling of vacancies, training from abroad, timely promotion and cashless medical facility.

However, a reality check reveals that in one year, not much change could be done in the direction of fulfilling the guarantees. The biggest issue before the election was regularisation of teachers. Six months back, CM Bhagwant Mann had announced that it would regularise 8,736 teachers but little has been done so far.

Another important guarantee was to stop getting non-teaching work from teachers. Though the government came up with the idea of appointing estate managers for carrying out non-teaching work, not much has been done in that direction. Between 10,000 and 15,000 teachers still render Services as booth-level officers.

Punjab becomes first state in India to start a bio-fertilizer lab

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To bring latest horticultural techniques to the farmers fields and to make horticultural crops competitive at the international level, Punjab and Food Processing Minister Chetan Singh Jauramajra on Friday inaugurated the Biofertilizer Laboratory under Horticulture Department at Citrus Estate, Hoshiarpur.

The laboratory has been built at a cost of Rs 2.50 crore under Rashtriya Krishi Vigyan Yojana to reduce the cost of chemical Fertilizers of the landlords in the state and to protect the Soil from contamination from chemical fertilizers, said Jauramajra.

The Minister said that in this laboratory, 10 types of organic fertilizers such as Azotobacter Carrier based, PSB Carrier Based, Azotobacter liquid formulation, PSB liquid formulation, Potassium solubilizing bacteria) have been produced in this laboratory through an MoU with ICAR-IARI. KSB liquid formulation, Zinc solubilizing bacteria (ZSB) liquid formulation, NPK providing liquid formulation, AM Fungi, IARI Compost inoculant, Trichoderma virdi) will be prepared, which will be made available to the farming community at district level at reasonable rates as per demand.

Apart from this, the Horticulture Department will also provide necessary technical information to the landlords regarding the use of these organic fertilizers by organizing awareness camps.

Punjab to give Rs 17,000 per acre compensation for pink bollworm attack on cotton

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To provide relief to the growers and farm labourers who suffered losses due to pink bollworm pest attack on cotton crops,Punjabchief ministerCharanjit Singh Channi announced increasing of compensation from Rs 12,000 to Rs 17,000 per acre, besides 10% of the relief to the farm labourers involved in picking of cotton additionally.

Channi said the enhanced compensation amount will add up to nearly Rs 200 crore expenditure, in addition to the already approved Rs 416.18 crore on account of compensation at Rs 12,000 per acre.

In the meanwhile, the State Government has agreed to resolve the issue of issues of land mapping. The payment of nearly 70,000 farmers has been stuck due to double entries of same khasra numbers for not fragmenting of land between siblings and they going to different arhtiyas for selling crop.

Punjab fares poorly in vaccinating its elderly

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Punjab is one of the worst-performing states in the country when it comes to vaccinating the Population in the 60-plus age group.

As per government data till August 18, just 22 per cent population belonging to the above-60 year group is fully vaccinated in Punjab. However, the national Average is 30 per cent. Punjab is on the 28th position among all states and union territories in the country. Neighbouring Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh are way ahead. Himachal Pradesh has fully vaccinated 63 per cent of its population, Jammu and Kashmir (43 per cent) and Haryana (38 per cent) of this age group.

Similarly, 47 per cent population in Punjab from the same group has received the first dose of the vaccine against the national average of 60 per cent. The coverage in Himachal Pradesh is 95 per cent, Jammu and Kashmir (93 per cent) and Haryana (73 per cent). Significantly, the state is continuously facing shortage of Vaccines. During a meeting with the Union Health Minister last week, Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh had sought supply of 55 lakh doses of Covid vaccine on priority for Punjab in view of the forthcoming festival season. Following this, the Union Health and Family Welfare Minister had ordered immediate increase in the states allocation by 25 per cent.

State on its way to contribute 35-40% wheat to national pool

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As the wheat procurement season is on its last leg in Punjab, the state is well on its way to contributing about 35%-40% in the national food grain pool, depending on the procurement in other states.Punjabis close to surpassing the 94% of the target as close to 124 lakh metric tonne (LMT)wheat has arrived in the grain markets of the state while theFood Corporation of India(Fci) had fixed a target of procurement of 132 LMT from the state. The target for the entire country has been fixed at 3,41.5 LMT.

During the last 14 years, Punjab had been contributing 30%-50% in the national pool. In terms of quantity, Punjab had contributed maximum 132.22 LMT in year 2021-22, but interestingly, it was the lowest in terms of Percentage in these 14 years as it turned out 30.5% while the state by contributing only 96.45 LMT (first time in 14 years at less than 100 LMT), it contributed maximum so far at 51.32% in 2022-23.

In 2021-22 the country had procured bumper crop at 433.44 LMT maximum so far and due to early heat waves in the month of March in 2022-23 the production was badly affected and the procurement was limited to only 187.92 LMT.