The Delhi Cabinet, led by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, on Wednesday gave its approval to the Smart Urban Farming Initiative.
Delhi will witness a sharp rise in its green cover under the Smart Urban Farming Initiative and public participation will help take the movement forward.
While presenting the proposal, the officials informed the Chief Minister that the initiative is part of the urban farming and terrace gardening scheme. The Smart urban farming initiative comprises two parts — urban farming training workshops and entrepreneurship training programmes.
The programme aims to raise citizen awareness of urban farming and to give a boost to the creation of green jobs in Delhi. It was further proposed to conduct 400 Urban Farming Awareness Workshops for citizens where 40 master trainers and 10,000 citizens will be trained; and 600 Entrepreneurship Training Programmes for citizens across Delhi through industry partners where 15,000 citizens will be given training workshops on a cluster basis. After due deliberation over the proposal, the Cabinet gave its approval to the scheme.
Kejriwal said, “During our budget announcements, we had taken up a key initiative to promote urban farming. Urban Farming is a unique project where people from all walks of life can start small-scale farming of fruits and vegetables within the confines of their balconies and terraces. The Delhi Government will train citizens to grow these crops in the urban setting. To promote the scheme, we will support urban farmers with seeds and other essentials.”
He said, “The initiative has been divided into two major components. First, those who want to grow fruits and vegetables for self-sustenance and consumption. Such people will get high-quality, organic vegetables in the comfort of their household and save money on shopping for groceries. Second, those who want to make a business out of this. This will help many citizens and especially housewives gain extra income through this source. It will act as an employment opportunity for them.”
Kejriwal said, “We will be hiring experts at a large scale for this project. We will tie up with the Indian Agriculture Research Institute for the same. The Delhi Government will organise 400 ward-level workshops under the first component of self-consumption. Another 600 workshops will be organised under the entrepreneurship component. We aim to educate and empower 25,000 families through these 1,000 workshops in the first year.”