<span style="color: #222222;">In Manipur, Chief Minister N Biren Singh has launched the Oil Palm Project through video conferencing. Oil Palm Mission Manipur was constituted in August this year with the Joint Director of Agriculture as Mission Director and a sub-committee was also constituted with State Principal Secretary (Health) as Chairman.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;"> </span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">Oil Palm cultivation is suitable in warmer region and the state government has identified 66,652 hectares areas in Chandel, Churachandpur, Imphal West, Bishnupur, Ukhrul and Thoubal districts. The state government had initially targeted to cultivate the oil palm on 200 hectares of land and procured seeds from Mizoram and Andhra Pradesh from the Central funding.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;"> </span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">The oil palm cultivation could be an alternative to jhum and poppy cultivation as oil palm is the highest vegetable oil yielding perennial crop with and effective income generation to farmers and beneficial to the environment as well.</span><br />'' <span style="color: #222222;">  Chief Minister congratulated the concerned officers for taking up Oil Palm project and said that the project had been taken up under the National Mission on oil seed and palm oil which aims to make India self-sufficient in edible oils and even export to other countries.</span><br />