Chemical-free fresh vegetables to be sold on wheels in Shimla

Every Friday starting from September 15, a mobile van carrying vegetables, fruits and other products like ghee, and pickles will be available at the state secretariat, Chotta Shimla, HPU campus, Summerhill and Krishi Bhawan, Boileauganj for a few hours, a statement said

Shimla: Farmers of Mashobra, Basantpur and Totu areas in the vicinity of Shimla city will be facilitated under the Prakritik Kheti Khushhal Kisan Yojana (PK3Y) to sell their chemical-free fresh produce on wheels.

To start with, every Friday starting from September 15, a mobile van carrying vegetables, fruits and other products like ghee, and pickles will be available at the state secretariat, Chotta Shimla, HPU campus, Summerhill and Krishi Bhawan, Boileauganj for a few hours, a statement issued here said.

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“We will do this on a pilot basis in the state capital as the consumers want to buy the chemical-free natural vegetables, fruits and other produce and based on the success, we will have more sale spots and gradually expand to other districts,” said State Project Director, PK3Y, Hemis Negi.

Around 200 farmers associated with natural farming are being involved in the process of maintaining the regular supply chain from different farmer clusters identified in three blocks in the Shimla district.

The State Project Implementing Unit (SPIU) has worked out modalities to run the mobile van and it would provide a Farmer Producer Company (FPC) fellow, working with PK3Y, to facilitate the sale of natural produce at the specified spots.

The PK3Y was launched five years back in Himachal Pradesh to promote the natural farming technique in the larger interest of sustainable agriculture and healthy produce for consumers.

Around 1.70 lakh farmers in the state are practising this chemical-free, low-cost and environment-friendly farming technique partially or fully on their fields, involving an area of over 24,000 hectares across Himachal Pradesh, the statement said.

The natural farming technique, propounded by Padma Shri awardee Subhash Palekar is based on indigenous cows. It reduces the dependence of farmers on the market as the farmers can prepare all the farm inputs with the cow’s dung, urine, jaggery, gram flour and locally sourced leaves at the farm itself, it added.