02.09.2016 Tribal farmer wins genome award Cheruvayal Raman, a tribal farmer at Kammana, near Mananthavadi, has bagged the National Plant Genome Saviour Award instituted by the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers Right Authority, India, for his lifetime engagement in protecting genetic diversity of rice. Mr. Raman has been conserving as many as 45 varieties of rice seeds, different species of trees, herbs, medicinal plants, and spices on his five-acre plot for the past many years. Being a joint family member of the Kurichya tribe, agriculture is part of his culture. While many of the Kurichya joint families are abandoning cultivation of traditional rice varieties owing to various reasons, Mr. Raman and his family have been conserving the seeds as a treasure for the next generation. He has established a network of farmers through an informal seed distribution mechanism by which the farmer transfers seeds to anybody on condition that the same amount is returned next year. “Seeds cannot be sold because it is love and care rather than a commodity,” Mr. Raman says. He welcomes visitors, including students, farmers, and researchers, from various parts of the country to his traditional house to learn about his natural way of farming. As a conservation activist, Mr. Raman has travelled across the State to sensitise students and farmers on conservation of genetic resources. Mr. Raman said the award was the nation’s recognition of a farmer like him and it would help him propagate the message of conservation values to others. Mr. Raman, along with wife Geetha, received the award from Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh at a function in New Delhi recently. ‘Kuruvai’ farmers faced with rat menace Rodents have been posing a problem to farmers who had taken up kuruvai’ paddy cultivation in parts of Lalgudi block. The crop has been raised on 4,874 hectares, with Lalgudi block accounting for a maximum of 3,215 hectares while Thuraiyur and other areas account for the balance 1,659 hectares. Farmers said that the recent showers had come as a blessing for them as the crop has started registering appreciable growth. But, the showers had also brought a problem in the form of rat menace. Realising the need for controlling rats, the Agriculture Department has planned to organise an awareness campaign among the farmers to destroy rats from the fields. Normally, the Department recommended use of zinc phosphate but it should be handled carefully and any negligence in washing hands would prove injurious to health. The Department has planned to conduct a campaign recommending the use of anti-coagulants which ensured safe disposal of rats, an official told The Hinduhere on Thursday. The use of anti-coagulants along with rice flour or some eatables would attract the rats. M. Muruganandam, a farmer of Koyyathoppe in Andanallur block said that the problem has come at a time when the crop was registering a fair growth. He had been availing the services of labourers who are skilled in catching rats. The labourers said that they were fully aware of the movement of rats from the burrows to the fields. “We keep a close watch on the impressions of the claws of the rats,” they said. Vegetable carving Tamil Nadu Agricultural University Information and Training Centre is conducting a two-day training programme on fruits and vegetable carving and preparation of soups and salads. The training fee is Rs 2,000. Training certificates will be issued to all participants. Date: September 7, 8 Time: 9.30 am to 4.30 pm Location: TNAU IT Centre, No. U-30, 10th Street, Anna Nagar. Culinary workshop Tamil Nadu Agricultural University Information and Training Centre is conducting a workshop on preparation of soups and salads on September 8. For time and venue details, call 044 - 2626 3484. Pink bollworm: Experts team visits villages A team of experts from the Central Integrated Pest Management Centre, Bengaluru, went to several villages, including Kottalachinta, Beeralli, in Sirguppa taluk of the district where BT cotton was cultivated, to undertake a comprehensive study about the pink bollworm attack this year. The team’s visit was in the wake of instructions from Union Agricultural Ministry, to make a study of the pink bollworm attack on cotton crop and submit a report, according to Rajalakshmi Keshagond, who heads the team. The team also collected information about the integrated pest management techniques adopted by the farmers, as suggested by the Department of Agriculture. This included cultivating a couple of rows of non-BT cotton on the border, using traps and lures, spraying of pesticide to destroy the pest among other things in the event of an attack. Others The other members of the team of experts included Asha, Vanita, Prabhavati, from Bengaluru. Bheemanna, scientist from University of Agriculture Science, Raichur, Shivanagouda Patil, Deputy Director, Basavanneppa, Project Coordinator, Agriculture Research Station Sirguppa and other officials were present. Pact on research on salt-tolerant rice As part of an effort to develop a rice variety that is tolerant to salt water, an agreement was signed between M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) and the University of Tasmania (UTAS) here on Thursday. The Australia-India Strategic Research Fund (AISRF) project, awarded to UTAS and MSSRF through a competitive bidding process, will explore the use of a halophytic, wild rice relative (Porteresia coarctata or also called Oryza coarctata) that occurs as a mangrove associate in the inter-tidal mangrove swamps along the coasts of India and Bangladesh. The three-year project will be supported by the Australia-India Strategic Research Fund (AISRF) during which time, scientists would conduct research on salt-tolerant rice varieties identified from wild species using biotechnology approaches in India and in Australia. The value of the research project is about one million USD. Sergey Shabala, School of Land and Food, UTAS, said developing a salt-tolerant rice variety was imperative for food security. By 2050, the world’s population is estimated to grow to 9.3 billion and to feed such a large number, there has to be an increase of 38 per cent in food production, he said adding that switching to saline agriculture was inevitable. “Salinity is a quiet crisis with 950 million hectares of arable land globally affected by it,” he added. Holger Meinke, Director, School of Land and Food, University of Tasmania, Hobart, who signed the agreement on behalf of UTAS, said “We need to produce as much food in the next 50 years as we did in the entire 10,000-year history of agriculture. This is the reason why we need these kinds of projects.” V. Selvam, Executive Director MSSRF, the Indian signatory to the project, spoke about the foundation’s work on mangroves and saline-tolerant plants. The Integrated Mangrove Fishing Farming System developed by MSSRF has been recognized as a ‘Blue Solution’ by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, he pointed out. Ajay Parida, principal investigator for the Indian side of the project, Lana Shabala, from UTAS and Gayathri Venkataraman and Sivaprakash Ramalingam of MSSRF, who shared the techniques that would be employed towards achieving this process, also spoke. City’s high-yielding tomato variety catches Tamil Nadu’s attention Bengaluru’s elite and high-yielding tomato variety ‘Arka Rakshak’, which recently got its researchers a national award, has now caught the attention of Tamil Nadu. The neighbouring State on Thursday sent a team of 30 horticultural and agricultural officials for live crop demonstration of the famed tomato variety on a nine-acre farm in Hennagara village of Anekal taluk by Karnataka’s progressive farmer M. Babu. The field day was organised by the Indian Institute of Horticultural Research (IIHR), whose researchers have developed the hybrid. ‘Arka Rakshak’ is being sought after by farmers in different States and a few foreign countries owing to its high-yielding potential, wherein farmers have collected 19 kg a plant. Another attraction is its resistance to diseases such as leaf curl virus, bacterial wilt and early blight, which helps reduce cost of cultivation by 10 to 15 per cent in terms of savings towards cost of fungicides and pesticides, according to scientists. The third advantage is long shelf-life which makes it ideal for long distance transportation. G. Alagumalai, Assistant director of Horticulture and Tamil Nadu State Horticulture Officers’ Association president, and co-ordinator of the field visit of officials from Tamil Nadu, told The Hinduthat officials would study various aspects of ‘Arka Rakshak’ to know if it would suit the climatic conditions of Tamil Nadu. Another official from Tamil Nadu said they would prefer taking up its cultivation on small tracts of land in different parts of the State on an experimental basis. However, the officials’ team was concerned over taste preferences as ‘Arka Rakshak’ is said to be a tad bit sweet, while culinary preparations in Tamil Nadu favour sour tomatoes. A.T. Sadashiva, principal scientist and Head of the Division of Vegetable Crops of IIHR, who led the team that developed ‘Arka Rakshak’, explained various aspects of the crop to the Tamil Nadu team. Agri expo to open tomorrow VIT University’s Centre for Sustainable Rural Development and Research Studies is organising a two-day Agri Expo – ‘Uzhavar Kalanjiam-2016’ – on September 3 and 4. The university’s chancellor G. Viswanathan, in a press release said, the expo would have more than 100 stalls that would be set up by organisations involved in horticulture, mushroom cultivation, dairying, bee-keeping, poultry development, drip irrigation, sericulture and food processing, according to a press release. This is the second year that the expo is being organised by the university.