By ARPITA SRIVASTAVA | NT
MAPUSA
While the agriculture department is working hard to come up with an agriculture policy for the state, there is a need to revive the Goa Fruit and Ornamental Plant Nurseries (Regulation) Act, 1995 to give more teeth to control the mushrooming of nurseries in the state especially along the national highway without proper permission from authorities.
The mushrooming of nurseries in barren fields along the national highway is gradually turning into a regular phenomenon across the state. The affected areas are Bardez, Tiswadi, Ponda and Salcete talukas where prime land along the national highway has been occupied by nurseries who deal in selling fruit and flower bearing plants. Nursery owners prefer busy roads so that they could get more customers to buy their plants.
Bardez taluka has a total of 12 nursery farms which is spread along the highway. It is learnt that out of the 12 nurseries only four are registered with the agricultural zonal office at Mapusa. Nurseries who have obtained all permissions from authorities are Mr Farmer at Guirim, Green Triangle at Parra and one at Siolim and Colvale.
According to sources, a nursery operator approaches farmers who have prime land along the national highway. The operator then buys the land in low lying areas and undertakes land filling so that proper display of plants can be made. Due to land filling it is learnt that the area gets blocked resulting in flooding during the monsoon.
When contacted the agricultural officer of Bardez Anant Hoble said, “In Bardez we have around four nurseries which are registered with us and they renew their licenses regularly, they even share their source of importing plants”.
Commenting on the nurseries which are not registered he said, “There are two types of nurseries, one is fruit bearing and flower bearing plants. In case of fruit bearing nurseries we are very vigilant because of pests etc. In flower bearing nurseries the vendors come for a few months and move to another place. Hence it is very difficult to have constant monitoring on nurseries.
“Flower bearing nurseries use low lying fields and dump mud in the fields due to which the water flow gets blocked. Our department does not permit them to dig wells nor permission is given for electricity, but still they manage to run their business” added Hoble.
He further added that “The nursery act needs to be more stringent and more powers need to be defined so that confiscation of illegal plants can be done which are illegally sold.
“I hope the new agricultural policy which is being drafted will give more power to crack down on illegal nurseries which are mushrooming” he said.
