Orissa to create cashew orchards over 10,000 hectares

Bhubaneswar, Jul 1 : The Orissa government today decided to create cashew orchards on 10,000 hectares of fallow land and barren hills.

A high-level meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, convened to review various aspect of the state's Cashew Corporation and also decided to transfer the cashew orchards, now lying under the Soil Conservation department, and in the non-forest area of the forest department to the Cashew corporation.
The meeting also decided to set up a modern cashew processing plant in a PPP mode and to dig trenches around the cashew orchards under the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.
The meeting was told that the Cashew Corporation has 578 orchards spread over 30,559 hectares of land in six divisions of the state.
Official sources said the corporation planned to plant cashew saplings in seven thousand hectares of private land and rejuvenate old cashew orchards in 370 hectares of land during the current year.
Among others, Agriculture Minister Pradip Maharathy, Orissa state Cashew Corporation Chairman Bikram Kesari Burma and other senior officers were present.

Source: http://www.newkerala.com/news/2011/worldnews-19050.html