Ministry of Agriculture provides opportunity to report crop damages
Mr. D.P. Wickremasinghe, Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Land and Irrigation made a special statement today (02nd) regarding the notification of crop damages.
This special media statement is issued today because the Ministry of Agriculture and all departments under the Ministry of Agriculture are working urgently under the leadership of the government to assess the damage caused to farmers engaged in agriculture due to the adverse weather conditions that prevailed across Sri Lanka in recent days and to take necessary measures to restore agricultural activities. What we primarily need is to collect accurate data about the damaged farmlands. Gathering information about damage to paddy cultivation and all other crops has become the main task at this time.
Since the field officers who usually participate in this have been affected by this disaster, we expect the support of farmers so that we can work quickly to obtain this information through several methods. If you have internet facilities, you can go to the Agrarian.lk website where information has been posted in all three languages under crop damage registration. Under that, the respective farmer can quickly submit this information together with family members.
If that is not possible, you can seek the assistance of the Agricultural Research and Production Assistant serving in the area, and it is possible to provide this information through him. If that is also not possible, we have provided the necessary facilities to go to any Agrarian Service Center and provide that information to us promptly with the assistance of the officers there. If there is any difficulty in obtaining those facilities as well, that information can be presented to us through the Agrarian Development District Office.
If it is difficult to provide information through all four methods, a special unit has been established at our ministry on the Hotline 1918, the Agricultural Disaster Relief Service of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Land and Irrigation, which is currently operational. You can call that number directly and inform that office established at the ministry about your crop damage. We will quickly refer the information received to the relevant divisions to provide the necessary compensation for crop damage currently operated through the Agrarian Insurance Board, to calculate the damage to other crops and take the necessary further steps, and to carry out the necessary actions to quickly restore these crops. Therefore, we kindly expect your prompt response in this regard.
