Bengal Govt gears up to celebrate World Food Day

Kolkata, Oct 16 : The West Bengal Government is going to celebrate World Food Day today. From the day she assumed the chair of Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee has worked towards ensuring food for all. The Food and Supplies Department is working towards fulfilling her dream. The Government has procured record quantity of paddy this year. 39.52 lakh metric tonnes of paddy have been procured from 6.29 lakh farmers at minimum support price. Ms Banerjee initiated the Khadya Sathi food security scheme to provide rice and wheat at Rs 2 per kg to around seven crore people, which is almost 90 per cent of the state’s population, including special packages for the people of Jangalmahal and the Hills, the Cyclone Aaila-affected, the farmers of Singur, workers and non-workers of closed tea gardens, the tribals of Totopara in Alipurduar district, and destitute and homeless people. Allocation of foodgrains under PDS has been increased manifold during the last six years. Special drive has been launched in association with the Health and Family Welfare Department to provide free-of-cost nutritional support ( package of 5 kg rice, 2.5 kg wheat, 1 kg masoor dal and 1 kg Bengal gram per month per month ) to approximately 4,000 severely acute malnourished children and their mothers per annum. Storage capacity of grains distributed through PDS has been enhanced from 62,000 metric tonnes (MT) to 6 lakh MT. Special food packages are distributed during festive season (Eid, Durga Puja, Kali Puja, Chhat) to cater to the needs of the people. The Bengal Government is committed to ensuring that every citizen of the state has access to food, according to a party statement here today. UNI