Core group of different departments & institutes to work for development of herbs in U’khand

PIONEER EDGE NEWS SERVICE/ Dehradun

The Uttarakhand government has decided to set up a core group comprising departments of Agriculture, Forest and Horticulture, the Herbal Development and Research Institute, the Aromatic Plant Centre and Uttarakhand Forest Development Corporation for development of herbs in the State. These departments and institutes will now work in coordination for production and marketing of herbs. 

A decision in this regard was taken in the meeting of the State-Level Monitoring Committee under the Forest department’s ‘Development of Non-Timber Forest Produce and Herbal and Aroma Tourism Project’” at the secretariat on Wednesday. The meeting was chaired by chief secretary Anand Bardhan.  

Referring to herbs as the USP of Uttarakhand, the CS emphasized the need to integrate herbs into the State’s economy. He directed that the Agriculture, Horticulture and Forest departments should work together to develop an action plan for herbal production and marketing. He said that the herbal nurseries should be developed into herbal and aroma parks and should be linked with tourism activities. The CS directed that the nurseries in Devvan (Chakrata), Khirsu, Jageshwar, Selaqui, Munsyari and other locations should be developed into herbal and aroma parks. He also directed that a nursery plan be prepared soon for this purpose.

The CS stated that 10,000 farmers are to be trained under the project. A training module should be developed soon for this purpose. He directed the Aromatic Plant Centre, Selaqui to be developed as the nodal agency for training. 

Bardhan said that in order to ensure the success of the scheme, district-level monitoring committees should be formed and regular monitoring meetings should be held. He added that special attention should be paid to herbal production as well as marketing. 

Principal secretary RK Sudhanshu, secretary Pankaj Kumar Pandey, PCCF (HOF)  Ranjan Kumar Mishra, PCCF (Van Panchayat) VP Gupta, additional secretary Vijay Kumar Jogdande and Himanshu Khurana along with other senior officers were present on the occasion.