Agriculture Minister Deepika Pandey on Thursday visited the lac factory of Jharkhand State Cooperative Lac Purchase-Sale and Withdrawal Union Limited (JHASCOLAMPF) located at Sidraul, Namkom. During her inspection visit she said that providing maximum benefit to the lac producing farmers of the State is a priority of the State Government. During this, she directed that the lac factory run by JHASCOLAMPF should also be improved and training activities should be done and buyer-seller conferences should be held for marketing of lac based products, and an agreement should be made with companies / institutions for institutional marketing. Along with this, information should be given to school and college students about lac products and its processing by taking them on a tour of the lac factory, Sidraul. She also inquired about various activities run by JHASCOLAMPF such as primary lac refining unit, lac sealing stick production. To benefit the lac farmers, the department should prepare a cabinet document for the supply of lac sealing sticks in the state and outside the state. Managing Director, JASCOlampf informed that lac is cultivated on Kusum, Bair, Palas and Semialata trees in mainly 9 districts of the state, namely Ranchi, Khunti, Simdega, Gumla, West Singhbhum, Saraikela-Kharsawan, Latehar, Palamu and Garhwa. At present, it is not possible to extract lac from lac farmers as the market rate is much higher than the minimum support price of Kusumi lac (Rs. 275 per kg) and Rangini lac (Rs. 200 per kg). In this sequence, the Minister directed that to provide maximum benefit to the lac producing farmers of the state, prepare a cabinet document for the supply of lac sealing stick in the state and outside the state. Managing Director informed that in the last two years, about 2000 lac farmers were provided training in scientific method of lac cultivation and lac value addition. Also, lac seeds and tool-kits used in lac cultivation are made available to lac farmers at 90 per cent subsidy. Lac sealing sticks were supplied to 12 districts in the state for election purposes. 312 LAMPS, PACS, Vyapar Mandal and Primary Lac Producer Cooperative Societies are associated with JSCLAMP. During the tour, Minister Pandey also inspected the construction work going on in the lac factory premises and directed to complete the construction work as soon as possible. On this occasion, Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Jharkhand, Managing Director, JSCLAMP, Executive Engineer, Building Construction Corporation, Assistant Engineer, ICDP Cell and other officials were present.

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