Chitral farmers provided incentives

CHITRAL: The Strengthening of Livestock Project (SLSP) has provided tremendous incentives to local farmers to improve their livelihood by introducing scientific methods in the livestock sector.

Talking to this correspondent here on Tuesday, Director SLSP Dr Fazli Ghaffar said the European Union-funded project was launched few years ago which was meant to strengthen the livestock department to extend and improve its services.

He said that people keep sheep in many areas of the district including Garam Chashma, Kalash valley and upper Chitral, and the processing of wool was a problem for them while the project had solved it by setting up a wool processing unit in Garam Chashma. The superb quality of wool was purchased by mill owners from down districts on ‘exploitative’ rate of about Rs80 per kilogram in its raw form, he said.

“Now the processed and carded wool will be sold at price as high as Rs700 per kilogram and this will change the very destiny of the farmers,” he said and added that this would also encourage the farmers to raise more sheep and this would further promote cottage industry in the area.

Dr Ghaffar said that seeds of improved Australian sheep were also provided to farmers by the organisation to multiply the race. He said that 2,600 chicken of Irish breed were distributed among women farmers who would distribute the eggs to other farmers to proliferate the race.

He said that 31 veterinary assistants of the department were provided with motorcycles in the district to ensure their availability to the farmers at their doorstops when needed. He said that it was not possible for the field staff to reach the farmers due to the fact that the district was sparsely populated.

Instruments of different nature were also provided to the department to help it to cure the ailing livestock which the department was short of, he said. The community participatory approach was also being used by the project as the farmers had been organised under shepherd organisations at village level.

The farmers of these organisations were sent to the agricultural institutes outside the district to impart them extensive training on livestock keeping while many persons would also be sent to an institute in Sargodha to receive training on operating the machinery of wool processing unit, he added.--Zahiruddin