Agri Deptt to rope in Gourmet Popcornica to boost corn production in J&K

JAMMU, MARCH 7: Principal Secretary, Agriculture Production and Farmers Welfare, Navin Kumar Choudhary, Monday chaired a meeting to discuss value chain development for maize in Jammu and Kashmir.

A team of Gourmet Popcornica LLP comprising Venkateswara Babu K, Yugandhar Yanamadala (CEO) and S B P Pattabhiramarao gave detailed information about their products and services.

Territory Head J&K, Policy Advocacy Research Centre (PARC), Ruchita Rane, also attended the meeting and shared her expertise.

Principal Secretary asked the Gourmet Popcornica team to conduct sample and soil testing in selected patches of land throughout the Union Territory. He also urged upon the Gourmet Popcornica team to provide marketing support to the farmers producing sweet corn and pop corn varieties of J&K. He said that the local private players would also be encouraged to partner with the leading popcorn company of India.

Principal Secretary said that the company would be provided land in Chakrohi RS Pura and twin districts of Rajouri and Poonch. In this regard, he directed the respective Directors of Agriculture department to identify land.

It was informed in the meeting that a total of 25 acre of land would be provided to find viability of various kinds of maize in Jammu region while equal area would be provided in Kashmir region for the purpose.
Principal Secretary took stock of present maize production statistics of Jammu and Kashmir regions and directed the Director Agriculture Kashmir to get quality assessment of local maize produce.

The meeting was attended by Director Horticulture (Planning & Marketing) Vishesh Pal Mahajan; Director Agriculture Jammu, KK Sharma; Additional Secretary Horticulture, Jahangir Hashmi; Joint Director Agriculture Jammu, AS Reen and Technical Officer, Sanjeev Khajuria while officers from Kashmir division participated online.