To boost dairy farming, govt offers 40% subsidy on machines

The Punjab Government has launched a new scheme to provide 40 per cent subsidy to the farmers on silage baler-cum-wrapper machines through Punjab Dairy Development Board to promote dairy farming in the state and to make it more advanced and profitable.

The government was making continuous efforts to modernise the production and maintenance of green fodder.

The increase in the area under green fodder would not only increase the milk production, but also reduce the area under traditional crops — wheat and paddy — which would also help save groundwater.

Implementation of this scheme, the progressive farmer who bought the machine would be provided financial assistance up to Rs 5.60 lakh by the government.

The availability of green fodder throughout the year had been an important issue for the dairy farmers. It was common that green fodder was surplus in some months, while remained in short supply in other months.

To tackle this problem, some progressive farmers were making silage from green fodder with their own efforts in a traditional way, but this could not be transported from one place to another place or stored for a longer period. But now with the invention of these advanced machines, silage balers made from green fodder could be easily wrapped and packed in bags, tubes and easily transported to small, landless farmers, urban dairies and green fodder deficient states.