Jorhat, July 30: The district agriculture department will distribute free vegetable and paddy seeds to flood-hit farmers in Jorhat district. It has also set up community nurseries to grow seedlings for sali crop.

District agricultural official (Jorhat) Jyotish Chandra Deka told this correspondent today that 250 packets of vegetable seeds have arrived here from Guwahati which would be distributed among the flood-hit farmers in the district.

Each packet contains over five varieties of vegetable seeds like ridge gourd, brinjal and cucumber.

The agricultural official said pesticides packets too had arrived along with the seeds and they (each packet weighing 750gm) would be distributed to the affected farmers.

Deka said the packets would be first distributed in Majuli as the island was the worst affected in the floods.

He said farmers who have incurred heavy losses would receive the packets in the first phase. There is a possibility of more such packets coming for all the flood-affected farmers, he added.

In Jorhat, a few villages at Jhanjimukh on the northeastern outskirts along the Brahmaputra were hit by the floods.

The official said 345 quintals of paddy seeds had arrived here last week, which were being distributed among the flood-hit people in the district.

Of the total paddy seeds, nearly 300 quintals were being given to farmers in Majuli while 45 quintals distributed in Jorhat.

Deka said the department, under the initiative of the district administration, was raising community nurseries for the flood-hit farmers inside tea gardens, on Assam Agricultural University campus and at the department’s plot in Kundargaon on the outskirts.

He said a one-hectare plot of tea garden land, three hectares inside AAU campus and three hectares at the department in Kundargaon were being used to set up the nurseries.

The officer said they needed nearly 10 hectares for the nurseries. While seven hectares have already been found, the search for another three hectares was on.

Deka said the seedlings would be distributed among the farmers soon.

Dispur had earlier directed the districts to search for vacant land and to set up community nurseries to help the affected farmers.