Lab for testing soil and water set up with cost of Rs 7 lakh: Mangat

Kapurthala, March 4, 2015: Punjab Agriculture department has set up soil testing lab to test delicate elements of water & soil in district Kapurthala at Phagwara. Disclosing this here today D.S.Mangat, Deputy Commissioner, Kapurthala said that this lab has been set up with the cost of Rs 7 lakh to facilitate the farmers of area.

Mangat said that this lab would not only help in testing particles of Zinc, Iron, Magnise but it would also be beneficial for testing ground water. He said that after setting up lab this year Agriculture department launched a drive to test crop growing soil of farmers from January 01, 2014 to January 01, 2015. During this period Total 4996 samples of soil were taken from farms of 25 different villages while many Farmers are being contacted directly to test their 412 samples.

Deputy Commissioner told that normal charges for testing soil is Rs 50 per sample but samples of farmers are tested free. He added that farmers are also advised to use fertilizers according to the soil of their farms. He also appealed to the farmers that they should benefit more & more from such initiatives of the government. Farmers should have their field soil & water tested from agriculture department lab and uses the prescribed fertilizers according to the soil of their fields to get better produce. He appealed to the farmers to adopt scientific approach in farming sect to get better results with low cost.