Dr. Bandula Gunawardena, minister of highways, transport, and mass media, and spokesperson for the Cabinet, predicted that the current scarcity of chemical fertilizer for farmers will resolve in less than a week.
According to the Minister, the Cabinet of Ministers has accepted the Agriculture Minister Mahinda Amaraweera’s request for the Paddy Marketing Board (PMB) to purchase paddy during the upcoming harvesting season.
According to Dr. Gunawardena, the Minister of Agriculture has already given the Cabinet of Ministers a plan to buy paddy this year during the Yala season.
In order to make the nation self-sufficient in rice the next year, over 850,000 small-scale and low-income paddy farmers would get subsidies to continue paddy production without interruption. Minister Gunawardena noted that high-quality seed paddy and fertilizer will also be made accessible to them for Rs. 82,000 million.
He mentioned that the money will be set aside for this project in the short-term, modified Budget 2022 that would be unveiled to Parliament the following month.
