Seminar on sandalwood farming held

Aurangabad, Feb 24:

Jaldoot NGO and Deogiri Nagri Sahakari Bank jointly organised a seminar on ‘How to do Sandalwood Farming’ at Kawadgaon in Paithan on Wednesday.

Vilas (Anna) Dahibhate, the first farmer in the State to get a licence to grow sandalwood, guided all the farmers and villagers. He said that there is a very favourable environment in Marathwada for planting sandalwood trees.

“If there is a record of sandalwood trees on 7/12 documents, police protection is given. In case of theft of trees, farmers get compensation under ‘Forest Act 1964. The sandalwood tree takes 10-15 years to grow,” he said.

Dahibhate sold one tree he planted for more than Rs 42,000. Chairman of the Bank Kishore Shitole said that sons of soil should do agriculture business and his bank is committed to financing them. Sarpanch Kiran Gade, Sheshrao Dhepe, Krishna Dhepe, Laxman Londhe, Amol Janjire, Fayyaz Shaikh and others took special efforts for the programme