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It gives me great pleasure as I take up duties as the Minister of Agriculture to steer Sri Lanka towards the establishment of a productive and strong agricultural sector striving in our effort to ensure food security and national prosperity of the country.
At a time when the Ministry is steadily moving from green revolution towards a white revolution our objective should be to reward the population mainly the farmer community with benefits derived from that effort.Agriculture in itself is the very basis of development and a thus a major platform of Sri Lanka’s economic prosperity. It is therefore a necessity that we must work towards strengthening a chain of interdependent and sustainable means fueling the fundamental way for agricultural development with the advance of technology and the improvement of the farmers’ quality of life.
I am of the view that one of the main responsibilities of the Ministry of Agriculture is to make the farmer a well-to-do person. To achieve this objective we must encourage the farmer community to produce food not only to meet the local demand but also to secure a place in the global market.
The Ministry of Agriculture along with the institutions operating under its purview is always ready to guide the farmer community towards receiving higher yield with low cost, utilizing both traditional agricultural practices and modern technology. We envision a newEra farmer who is educated, technology-equipped and good at business management.The Ministry has taken measures to extend the helping hand to youth agro-entrepreneurs by providing them with technological and financial support in addition to knowledge and expertise to be provided by agricultural colleges.
As the Minister of Agriculture my vision is to embark on an energetic and ambitious tenure to guide the Ministry, as it engages instriving to achieve the Government’s vision of modernizing Agriculture whilst offering exciting opportunities and a facing many challenges.Finally I would like to assure the farmer community that the Ministry is always committed to offering its utmost towards fulfilling their needs in their untiring effort to feed the nation amidst numerous challenges of the Nature.
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