Bhubaneswar, Dec. 7: The per capita income of the state's farmers is much less than the national average despite Odisha winning the Krishi Karman award four times in the past five years for its record achievement in food production.

Agriculture, fisheries and animal resources minister Pradeep Maharathy today placed this written reply in the Assembly.

While the per capita income of the farmers at the national level is pegged at Rs 6,426, that of Odisha farmers hovers around Rs 4,976.

Maharathy said: "In the past one decade, the income of farmers has gone up. While in 2002-03, the per capita income of the farmer was Rs 1,062, it has leapfrogged to Rs 4,976 by 2014."

At the same time, the per capita income of a farmer in Punjab stands at Rs 18,059, Haryana Rs 14,434, Kerala Rs 11,888, Rajasthan Rs 7,350, Gujarat Rs 7,926, Maharashtra Rs 7,386, Tamil Nadu Rs 6,980 and Andhra Pradesh Rs 5,979.

Now, the state has 32.79 lakh farmers and 24.20 lakh agricultural labourers. Of the 32.79 lakh farmers, only 5,574 have more than 10 hectares.

Similarly, 63,688 farmers have land between four to 12 hectares and 3.11 lakh farmers have land between two to four hectares, while the rest have less than two hectares and some even have less than one hectare.The minister also informed the House that farmers had shown interest to cultivate potato.

"The potato mission is working in this direction. While in 2014, potato had been cultivated in 15,808 hectares, it has been increased to 25,183 hectares."

To attract the farmers to opt for potato cultivation, the minister said the state government was giving Rs 20,000 subsidy per hectare.

"The state government has signed an MoU with the National Seeds Corporation, National Horticulture Research and Development and the Odisha State Seeds Corporation for production of potato seeds," the minister said.

However, Opposition members today alleged that the potato mission was a failure and the farmers were not getting any government help.