The
leechi may soon be seen in a new avatar as two private companies are keen to use the fruit - that grows in abundance in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district -
to produce wine.
Last year ICAR director Mangala Ram had impressed upon Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar that the state could increase its revenue by using the 'shahi leechi' variety of the fruit, largely grown in Muzaffarpur, for making wine.
Impressed by the proposal, the state government decided to set up plants in Muzaffarpur for this purpose.
Wine from the fruit would help leechi farmers as they would not be forced to sell leechis at throwaway prices.
About 70% of India's leechis are grown in and around Muzaffarpur and the number of farmers cultivating it has grown in the last decade. The numbers may soon hit a new 'high'!
The humble 'baingan' is sure making waves. Even as the BT Brinjal controversy rages, comes the news that
farmers in Gurgaon have found a new way of not only multiplying the yield of ordinary brinjals but also improving their shape!
These farmers have discovered that brinjals, like humans, love alcohol. They sprinkle alcohol in the soil right from the time they sow the seed, and the plants respond by increasing their yield manifold.
Agricultural scientists, however, believe that there is no scientific basis for the claim as alcohol evaporates within 10 minutes of spraying.
Brinjals can't talk. But, as the farmers have discovered, they love their 'chhota' too. And how! The next time you feel a little tipsy after having 'bhartha', know that the brinjals came from Gurgaon.
Mister Big Sugar is our minister of agriculture,
Food prices are soaring because he is the vulture;
He says he will feed
The poor who do bleed,
We know; plucking to the bone ain't corruption-culture.
Gujarat’s economy has been outperforming the rest of the country since 1990. However, this has been largely because of rapid industrial growth, not agriculture.
But Narendra Modi has done it in agriculture too. Since 1990, Gujarat's agricultural economy has clocked a 9.5% annual growth, three times the national average. In fact in wheat and pulses, the growth rate nearly doubled, and in cotton, it has jumped over 3.5 times.
According to a
study published in the Economic and Political Weekly, this has happened because the Gujarat government has aggressively pursued an innovative agriculture development programme by liberalising markets, inviting private capital, reinventing agricultural extension, improving roads and other infrastructure. A mass-based water harvesting and groundwater recharge movement has created a vast corpus of check dams, percolation ponds, boribunds and farm ponds that have increased the availability of groundwater.
A group of farmers in Odisha have turned an arid drought-prone area into one of plenty. Not due to any steps taken by the government but thanks to a training program being conducted by an NGO, Manav Adhikar Seva Samiti, where farmers are taught to conserve water and minimise impact on groundwater by
harvesting rainwater in small man-made ponds. 22 ponds have already been made by farmers and these have proved to be very cost-effective. Despite deficient and erratic rainfall, the results are encouraging.
Sitaram Majhi used to migrate to Hyderabad to work. Now he grows vegetables in his 8-acre farm. For Tulsi Amar, another migrant labourer, who has taken to organic farming because he could not afford fertilisers, the results have been dramatic. He grows 20 types of vegetables.
More such self-help efforts need to be encouraged.
Trust Punjab to keep coming up with surprises, of all hues.
Punjab consumes about Rs 600 crores of bananas each year and most of them come from Gujarat and Maharashtra. But all that is set to change.
The state is starting to go bananas in big way.A banana trial on a 10-acre plot by Mewa Singh in Ludhiana gave him a net profit of Rs 1,50,000 per acre. Compare this to the Rs 30,000 that wheat and rice yield and you will understand the mad rush on now to grow the king-size G9 banana.
Around 1,96,000 tissue culture plants were sold in the August-September season. Land under the crop is set to touch 500 acres. Big companies like Godrej, FieldFresh and Bharti Walmart have also got interested as the Punjab banana tastes better. Any surprise?
The rest of the world may be suffering due to the effects of global warming, but Ladakh is reaping the benefits of the plantation drive launched by the Defence Institute of High Altitude Research.
Oxygen content in the air has
gone up by 50% in this around 12,000 feet high altitude desert due the abundance of poplar and willow trees, wheat cultivation, horticulture and greenhouses. These have also brought in rain for the first time.
Earlier Ladakh used to depend on Chandigarh for its supply of vegetables. Now, 58% of the requirement is met locally. With the help of scientists and local farmers, 13 types of apples have been produced and there are plans to undertake organised plantation of vitamin rich Seabuckthorn, Leh Berry, that grows wildly.
Plan a trip. The days of gasping for breath there are over.
North India is contributing 5% to the total rise in sea levels due to excessive pumping out of ground water, according to a study.
In this 2000 km long stretch,
54 trillion litres of ground water are extracted every year. This is the largest rate of groundwater loss in a comparable-sized region on earth, and is likely to cause serious concern over future water availability in the region.
This water eventually reaches the sea through rainfall or runoff from the land, leading to 0.16mm rise in sea level. This is roughly equivalent to the rise due to melting Alaskan glaciers.
A study should also be done on the amount of water that is being prevented from reaching the sea due to diversion of river waters for irrigation, drinking etc. There may well be no net rise in sea level!
Luscious Lichees are soon likely to be available all through the year. This fruit, which arrived in India
from China via Myanmar in the 18th century, is presently harvested in May and June only and is grown mainly in Bihar, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh.
Scientists in the Lichee Research Institute, Muzaffarpur, have
developed new varieties that can be planted in various agro-climatic zones and harvested in different months. Plants of Longan, the variety that can be harvested in August, have already been supplied by the institute to farmers. This light brown coloured Lichee will begin to bear fruits in just three years. Work on a January harvesting variety is also on.
If these efforts bear “Lichee”, not only will we enjoy it in all seasons, India may well overtake China to become the largest producer in Asia.
Despite rainfall being less than usual this year in Sikkim, the production of tomatoes, flowers and vegetables increased by 25%.
The credit for this goes to
a technique developed by Pune engineer Rajesh Edke , that uses bamboo instead of steel rods to build polyhouses, which greatly reduces construction costs and makes them affordable for the farmer.
The polyhouse protects the crops from bad weather. It also facilitates the collection of carbon dioxide generated by the plants, which is recycled by them for growth.
“
With an area of 250 sq m, each of these polyhouses can generate an annual income of Rs 80,000 to Rs 1,00,000 for the farmer. We now plan to provide bamboo polyhouses to over 40,000 families." says K.K. Singh, Director, Horticulture, Sikkim.
A good example of developing techniques that directly benefit the agriculturist!
