Date:28/12/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/12/28/stories/2008122855250600.htm

Tamil Nadu

Scheme to improve economic status of women farmers

R. Vimal Kumar

Tirupur: The economic status of women farmers in and around Tirupur is poised to get better as Veterinary University Training and Research Centre (VUTRC), Tirupur, affiliated to Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, plans to supply 400 goats free to them over three months starting January. The animals will be distributed at the rate of one per farmer, who will be selected from among those living below the poverty line.

Meat

R. Selvaraj, Associate Professor and Head, VUTRC, told ‘The Hindu’ that the aim of the scheme would be to alleviate poverty in the rural areas as well as to increase meat production from the region.

Under this project, a female goat of nine months to a year-old will be procured for distribution with the financial assistance of various non-governmental organisations like Rotary and Lions Clubs.

Conditions

“One of the conditions set under the project is that the beneficiary should give back the first female progeny to the VUTRC, which in turn will be ‘rotated’ to another farmer,” Dr. Selvaraj said.

The farmer will be entitled to keep the remaining kids born during the first breeding as well as the other young goats produced in the chain subsequently.

To ensure that the first female kid was given back, the VUTRC will take an undertaking from either the president of the respective village panchayat or from a prominent person of the respective village from where the farmer hails.

Dr. Selvaraj said that the distribution of goats for rearing was expected to develop an overall asset of about Rs. 40 lakh among the rural areas covered before the end of the 11th Five-Year Plan period.