Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today released the soil-use map of six districts of the state — Birbhum, Burdwan, Hooghly, Howrah, Nadia and North 24-Parganas.

The map has been prepared by the National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning under the Indian Council for Agricultural Research.

The exercise, aimed at boosting agricultural productivity in the state, was launched in January 2007 and was carried out at a cost of Rs 1.5 crore. The entire expenses were borne by the state government. “Agricultural productivity is of great concern for us and the soil-use map has been prepared so that we understand the quality of soil and what a farmer should do to enhance the quality and produce a better yield of the crops sown,” Bhattacharjee said.

Mapping for the entire state will be over by end of June next year, he added.

In fact, West Bengal is the second state after Jharkhand to have undertaken the exercise. “In Jharkhand the samples have been collected in 2-km grid and there productivity has increased by 2 per cent. In Bengal, however, the samples have been collected in a 1-km grid. A total of 76,000 samples have been collected from all over the state and that had been analysed. We will finish preparing the map by June-end next year,” Dipak Sarkar, Director, National Bureau of Soil Survey, said.

He also said that scientists faced problems in collecting samples from Naxalism-affected areas of West Midnapore district. “Because of Naxal threat our people could not work there. We brought the problem to the notice of the chief minister and he said he would provide us with adequate security,” Sarkar told The Indian Express.