Aizawl, 13 July (IANS): Aizawl: The Mizoram government has undertaken a Rs 270 crore New Economic Development Policy (NEDP) to boost the state’s economy and livelihood of the people, an official said on Wednesday.
“The NEDP would execute from this current financial year (2016-17) aiming to lead Mizoram from a subsistence-based economy to a market-based economy. Rs 270 crore has been sanctioned to carry out the policy,” said an official elease here quoting Mizoram Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla.
“The success of Mizoram government’s flagship programme — New Land Use Policy (NLUP) — has given birth to this new policy – NEDP,” the release quoted Lal Thanhawla as saying in a meeting on Tuesday.
Based on the performance of NEDP, further allocation would be made in the coming years.
The Chief Minister said that the NLUP has brought a number of visible steps up and changes and has generated sustainable means of livelihoods and opened new avenues for the people.
“The success of NLUP needs to be augmented, supplemented and converged wherever possible within NEDP,” the Chief Minister added.
The Mizoram government in 2010 launched the Rs 2,873-crore NLUP to give financial assistance to over 125,000 families and provide them training for permanent settled farming instead of ‘jhum’ cultivation.
Tribals in the northeastern states practise ‘jhum’ or slash-and-burn cultivation.
This shifting form of farming usually involves cutting down of entire forests in the hills and allowing the slashed vegetation to dry on mountain slopes prior to burning.
Rice is grown along with vegetables, maize, cotton and mustard, among others.
Tribals constitute 27 per cent of northeast’s 45.58 million people.
Lal Thanhawla said that NEDP had earned praise from various quarters of society and the people have a lot of hope and aspiration from the new policy.
The Mizoram government would launch Chief Minister’s Rural Housing Scheme to improve habitations of the economically weaker sections of the society in rural areas.
The meeting on Tuesday also stressed upon the need to develop private-public partnerships with interested individuals or groups for adding value addition to various agricultural, horticultural and other produce.
The chief minister said that a memorandum of understanding (MoU) was recently signed between the Mizoram government and the Tata Trust wherein the latter would contribute Rs 18 crore for promoting livelihood activities to supplement the NLUP programme.
An additional Rs 2.30 crore has already been provided by Tata Trust for supportive dairy intervention programme (SDIP) in Mizoram.