sirf ek muthi dal can do the kamaal - sardarkrushinagar …€¦ · · 2017-10-25smaller groups...
TRANSCRIPT
The United Nations has christened 2016 as International Year of Pulses, which is conspicuous from planet health point of view. Pulses can be regarded as corner stone of nutrition particularly for vegetarians as a rich source of protein. They also have high densities of minerals like iron, zinc and bers. , they thwart, and promote health of
gut and heart. Pulses have also been evidenced to contain bio-active compounds that help to combat cancer, diabetes, heart and gut ailments. Further, consequent upon their habit of requiring lesser water and x atmospheric nitrogen, they may be designated as root engineers mobilizing many microbes and thereby obviating the over ridiculed downsides of chemical fertilizer. The implicit saving on large input subsidies with cultivation of pulses vis-a-vis other crops having high irrigation and fertilizer requirements cannot be over scored. Over and above, there are over a dozen of pulses, each having unique texture and avor and can be processed and cooked into variety of preparations satiating myriad consumers’ preferences. These crops are variants in duration from around 60 to over 300 days and can be squeezed in any set of growing conditions as solo, intercrop or mixed crop.
Pulses that are on about 25 million hectares of land, predominant (84%) of
which is rain-fed, can be regarded as health line of India. Over time,
production of pulses has failed to catch up with demand. Output has grown
less than 2% average in the last 20 years, while acreage has grown even lesser
January-February, 2016
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FROM VICE CHANCELLOR’S DESKSirf Ek Muthi Dal can do the kamaal…..
Major Events
pg 1
3pg SDAU Organizes Sui-Generis Workshop on Forward Thinking for Agricultural Development
4pg SDAU Facilitates a National Workshop on ICTs for Sustainable Agricultural Development
5pg th Celebration of the 70 Republican day5pg Agroforestry Day Celebration5pg Zonal Research and Extension Committee
Meeting5pg National Workshop on Export Procedure and
Promotional Schemes for Agricultural Commodities
6pg Wheat Research Station Celebrated Farmers' Day 7pg Save Bird Campaign7pg Equine Show and Exhibition7pg Expert Lecture by Dr Ramsay Chaudhary,
Small Animal Practitioner, USA
11pg FODDER FOR THOUGHT
at 0.8%. Not surprisingly, yield rose only 0.9%.
After independence, annual production of
pulses would hover around 12-14 million
metric tonnes. The spurred activities under
National Food Security Mission boosted the
production of pulses to 20 million metric
tonnes, though soon it dwindled to 18 million
metric tonnes. This simply shows that pulses
as a group is grown on marginal land; that it
has been neglected despite multi pronged
advantages, largely due to increased emphasis
on green revolution and that a little focus can
give impetus to production. Therefore,
declaring 2016 as “International Pulses Year”
cannot be timelier considering the intractable
cyclic nexus of pollution- climate change-
water-energy- agriculture- ecology-livelihood
security that the world is facing.
Dal complements amino acids prole of Roti
and offers a wonderful source of nutrition in
p o o r m a n ’ s d i e t . I n d i a s t a n d s o u t
conspicuously not only in production and
consumption of pulses, but is equally unique
in growing over a dozen of pulses over
d i f f e r e n t s e a s o n s a n d a g r o - c l i m a t i c
conditions. However, prices of pulses have
shown whopping trends of volatility. At one
point of time, prices of pulses like pigeonpea
had deed INR 200/kg. As such, despite an
indispensible source of nutrit ion for
vegetarians; the exorbitant prices aggravate
the accessibility and affordability over and
above insufcient availability of pulses. They
seem like slipping away from the hands of the
poor; and have become a snobbish and a
luxury item that only the better-off could
afford. All this has happened while India
imported 4.6 million metric tonnes of pulses in
2014-15, up by 27 per cent over the previous
year.
The agriculture comprised the nub of
development adopted by modern India.
However, pulses were nudged to marginal
lands due to increased policy emphasis on
crops that mattered under green revolution.
Pulses remained abysmally unattended in
agr i cu l tura l po l i c ies for product ion ,
procurement, marketing and developing post
harvest technologies. The obvious irony can be
gauged from the fact that where as famers’ price
for raw whole pulse like pigeonpea hovers
around INR 30/kg, it is sold in market
sometimes over INR 200/kg after processing.
This simply evinces that pulses remained bereft
of ve basic pillars of development viz,
technology, risk & nancing, institutions,
policy, and training & skill development. The
current technological pin up to pulses is
laudable; the schemes like Pradhan Mantri
Beema Yojna, Jan Dhan Yojna and Skill India are
likely to provide scale, security and stability to
production of pulses. A holistic plan,
encompassing the so called ve pillars should
be used to impact a change in present scenario
of pulses production to change the future of
pulses production. It would not be out of place
to mention that when there was shortage of
technical persons in industries, India started
ITIs; can such institutions be mooted to build
capacity for ve pillars of development and
promote skills in production and processing of
pulses?
A stful of pulses comprise a healthy and
sustainable food; and is good enough to meet
the daily protein requirements, could it be
beseeched that production of pulses be
declared as social responsibility owing to
advantages of pulses in countering hunger,
malnutrition, soil health, environmental health
and human health. Sirf Ek Muthi Dal can prove a
game changer in promoting consummate
health of the planet Earth. “Mast” in Gujarati
means awesome and “Mast” mode entailing
Management of resources, Awareness among
consumers like polio drop advertisement “Sirf
Ek Muthi Dal”, Seed and its quality and Time of
seeding, harvesting and other operations can
do the trick.
(Ashok A. Patel)
SDAU Organizes Sui-Generis Workshop on Forward Thinking for Agricultural Development
SDAU organized a sui-generis workshop of its
type on, “Forward Thinking for Agricultural th thDevelopment in Western India”, from 8 -10
February, 2016 in collaboration with NAARM,
APAARI, GFAR and IAITA under the
mentorship of Dr Ajit Maru and Dr Robin
Bourgeois from GFAR, FAO, Rome. Eighty-
s e v e n r e p r e s e n t a t i v e s o f d i f f e r e n t
stakeholders were actively involved in the
process of developing systematic foresight
based on forward thinking for agricultural
development by 2030. Introducing the nub of
the workshop, Dr Ajit Maru narrated that
agriculture is passing through a critical phase
of technological t ransformat ion and
agriculture of today will not remain
agriculture fteen years hence. The farmer will
become more like a computer operator
controlling all the eld operations remotely
with computers. The scenario certainly
fascinates, but it would take around 15 years to
train a PhD student with a changed mindset.
He reiterated that in a country like India
agriculture is the mainstay, and hence
innovations and capacity development are
cardinal for the overall development. Giving
his presidential address, Prof (Dr) Ashok A
Patel, Hon Vice chancellor narrated the
downsides of wrong crop husbandry and
related issues despite incredible upsides of
ensuring food and nutritional security over
the major swathes of the world. He saw
technologies as the major reprieve and desired
that right types of technologies need to be
promoted in consonance to the precise needs
of local farmers without losing sight of global
issues. Dr Robin Bourgeois introduced the need
for looking at future through multiple lenses
involving all the stakeholders. The forward
thinking entails wanted and unwanted factors
that work linearly and plausibly converge
somewhere due to discontinuities that leads to
d i f fe rent scenar ios . Af ter s t ruc tured
presentations of experts to orient delegates on
forward thinking process and methodologies;
the delegates were divided into ve and four
smaller groups for agriculture and education,
respectively. Each group identied and dened
the forces of change along with their states for
agricultural development in Western India by
2030 us ing STEEP Approach (Soc ia l ,
Technological, Economical, Ecological and
Policy) and came up with different scenarios
like “Business as Usual, Sailing with Broken Sail
and Cart to Car”. Using output of the groups, the
experts guided the delegates to capture
strategic elements for transformation of
agricultural development in Western India
using backcasting approach. The workshop
was also graced by Dr Rama Rao, Director,
NAARM, Hyderabad and Dr Raghunath
Ghodake, Executive secretary, APAARI. A
compendium of the workshop written by Dr S
Acharya , Dr J M Patel and Sh Dhaval J Joshi;
and a policy paper entitled “Water : A Cardinal
Input for Enhancing Agricultural Production”
authored by Prof (Dr) Ashok A Patel and Dr S
Acharya, was also released on the occasion. Dr
S Acharya, Associate Director of Research was
the Organizing Secretary of the workshop.
SDAU Facilitates a National Workshop on ICTs for Sustainable Agricultural Development
The Indian Association for Information
Technology in Agriculture (IAITA) conducted
a National Workshop on Application of
Information and Communication Technologies
( I C T s ) f o r S u s t a i n a b l e A g r i c u l t u r a l thDevelopment at Sardarkrushinagar on 11
February, 2016 in collaboration with SDAU.
One hundred and twenty-four participants
attended the workshop. Prof (Dr) Ashok A
Patel, Hon Vice Chancellor, SDAU elicited that
ICTs are going to be the major plank for
accessing knowledge and technologies in near
future; and that precision agriculture is likely to
play an important role in demand driven
market. Delivering his key note address, Dr Ajit
Maru, Senior Knowledge Ofcer, GFAR, FAO
delved in to the status of value addition and
strengthening the current agri-food chain F2F
mode, besides emphasis on recycling of
biomass, energy and environment. Four lead
presentations were made on “Applying GIS
Based Farm Models" by Dr Walter Meyers,
CEO, ProGIS; "Sensing technologies and Data
Analytics in Agriculture” by Dr Sanjay
Chaudhary and Dr Mehul Raval, Ahmedabad
University, “ICTs for Enabling Learning and
Rapid Innovations in Agriculture" by Prof (Dr)
Ashok A Patel; and “An Approach for Forward
Thinking ICT Application in Agriculture” by
Mr Robin Bourgeois, Senior Foresight Advisor,
GFAR, FAO, Rome. The current scenario and
potentials of available ICTs in agriculture was
discussed that could provide single window
sys tem for a l l s takeholders for c rop
distribution, nutrition, irrigation, food safety,
marketing and value chains. In the end,
delineating a l ineage between ethical
revolutions and relationship between human
and tools, it was emphasized that though eld
operations might be replaced with sensors for
data collections, human with articial
intelligence and the farmers of future are
something like scientists/technicians without
any physical presences in the farm, yet the
important considerations would be what are to
be changed, and for that how the technologies
are to be used; and of course, what are the
anticipated problems related to societal choices
and values that could emerge should be very
clear. After structured presentations of experts
to orient delegates on application of ICTs in
agriculture; the delegates were divided in to
three groups to deliberate, identify and dene
the forces of change including skill and capacity
development for application of ICTs in
agriculture using STEEP Approach (Social,
Technological, Economic, ecological and
Policy). Using output of the groups, the experts
guided the delegates to capture strategic
elements for transformation of agricultural
development through application of ICTs using
backcasting approach.
th thThe 70 Republican day was celebrated on 26
January, 2016 in SDAU. The school children
conducted street rally with decorative ags
and patriotic slogans on banners from School
ground to statue of Shri Sardar Vallabhbhai
Patel, where Hon Vice Chancellor, Prof (Dr)
Ashok A Patel garlanded the statue and pay
reverence to the great Iron man of India. The
ag hoisting ceremony was held at the school
ground. As a symbol of giving utmost respect
to girl child, the honour of ag hoisting was
Agroforestry Day Celebration
Agroforestry Research Station, celebrated the
Agroforestry day at village Salempura, Ta thPalanpur, Dist-Banaskanta on 28 January,
2016 under the chairmanship of Prof (Dr)
Ashok A Patel, Hon Vice-Chancellor, SDAU.
Salempura village is one among the thirty-two
villages adopted by the SDAU for holistic
development by intervention of new
technologies. During the celebration, expert
lectures were arranged on the different aspects
of agroforestry related systems besides
importance of MPTs trees in agroforestry and
use of medicinal plant in countering diseases
and pests problems. Special emphasis was laid
on boundary plantation of trees and two tier
intervention of horticulture entailing fruit
plants and vegetable crops. More than 150
farmers inc luding youth and women
participated in the event. The participants also
took part in plantation drive along the temple
boundary. The scientists-farmers interface; visit
to on site demonstrations and awards to
intensive tree growers of the village were the
other highlights of the event.
thCelebration of the 70 Republican day
given to Kumari Abhaben Joshi, a girl student of
C P College of Agriculture. In her address,
Kumari Abhaben cited contribution of freedom
ghters in freedom movement. With a proud
feeling of gratitude evident on her face, she
requested everyone to dedicate and devote
ones' services towards nation building to create
social harmony and national unity. The event
was graced by university ofcers, scientists and
employee led by Hon Vice Chancellor, Prof (Dr)
Ashok A Patel.
Zonal Research and Extension Committee Meeting
The Directorate of Extension Education
organized the Zonal Research and Extension
Advisory Committee meeting for kharif-2016 st
on 21 January, 2016. Ninety-ve participants
entailing scientists, ofcers from line
departments and progressive farmers actively
participated. It was specially emphasized to
undertake a versatile research programme on
organic fa rming bes ides overcoming
pernicious problem of pink ball worm in cotton
and suggesting ways to increase the organic
carbon content in soil.
National Workshop on Export Procedure and Promotional Schemes for Agricultural Commodities
SDAU organized a National Workshop on
Export Procedure and Promotional Schemes for th thAgricultural Commodities in India on 25 -26
February, 2016 in collaboration with NABARD,
DGFT and GAAS. Mr A K Singh, Joint Director,
DGFT in his introductory remark delved in
quality of the commodity and the pricing
mechanism to promote export of agriculture
products. Sh Ramanbhai N Patel, Chairman,
Gujarat Agricultural Marketing Board held, out
that there have been different decades for
different events and the current decade belongs
to Indian foods, textiles and culture. However,
there is dire need to add values to each of our
products besides communicating to the world
on the signicance and value of our products.
Our products are incredible, but there is a need
of packaging and processing expertise to cope
up with consumers' preferences and transitory
nature of global food industries. The Hon Vice
Chancellor, Prof (Dr) Ashok A Patel, in his
presidential speech touched the dwindling
availability of land for agriculture besides
dissipating productivity of the natural base
including soil. He wondered at the plight of the
farmer, who despite trying production
scenarios is abysmally handicapped to get
remunerative prices for his production. The
protability in farming could be initiated only
by good agricultural practices, quality
production, processing and consumers' centric
packaging that could add traceability, quality
and safety aspect to agriculture produce. A
workshop compendium and book on Simaruba
was also released on the occasion. The workshop
comprised three technical sessions that included
15 lectures on the subject related to export of
agriculture commodities, its regulations and
procedural protocols and promotional schemes.
The important speakers included Mr Mihir Shah,
Expert Faculty, Federation of Indian Export
Organization, Mumbai; Mr Alok Dwivedi, Dy
Director, DGFT,; Mr Parit Bhadoria, ICICI bank;
Mr Piyush Pankaj, Export Credit Guarantee
Corporation Limited (ECGC); Dr Vinod Kumar,
DGM, NABARD; and Mr Tanuj Bist, OSD,
Kandla Special Export Zone. The workshop was
attended by 330 farmers, 250 students and 200
faculty members and traders. The panel
discussion witnessed many question from
students, faculty, farmers and exporters to
experts. Dr K P Thakkar, Assistant Professor,
CPCA was the Organizing Secretary of the
workshop.
Wheat Research Station Celebrated Farmers' Day
Wheat Research Station, Vijapur organised a t h
farmers' day on 13 February, 2016 to
commemorate the newly released wheat
variety GW 451 to the services of the farmers.
GW 451 has higher productivity with good
grain quality with high density of Fe and zinc.
GW 496 is a two decade old variety but still
holds the grounds mainly due to grain
appearance. This is despite many good varieties
were released during this period and two of the
ten most indented varieties at the national level
are from Vijapur. GW 451 is a trailblazer and has
caught the imagination of the farmers due to
grain appearance and grain quality. The variety
is pitched to play a pivotal role to alleviate
malnutrition and hidden hunger. The event was
attended by one thousand odd farmers and
farm-women besides Dr M S Patel, renowned
Soil Scientist & Member, Board of Management,
University Ofcers, Scientists of various
Research Stations, Ofcers of line Departments,
District/Taluka Coordinators of ATMA etc. In
his scintillating presidential address Prof (Dr)
Ashok A Patel, Hon Vice-Chancellor gave account
of the farmers' centric activities of the SDAU and
exhorted them to adopt good agricultural
practices and rear Kankrej, a versatile native breed
of cattle.
Save Bird Campaign
College of Veterinary Science and AH
organized, “Save Bird Campaign” entailing th thBird treatment and rehabilitation on 13 -14
January, 2016 during Kite festival. The
c a m p a i g n w a s j o i n t l y o r g a n i z e d i n
collaboration of NGO's viz., Jiv Seva Sansthan,
Arihant Group and Smt M J Jaganiya Charitable
Trust, Vishwas Welfare Foundation, Jai Jaliyan
Trust and Shiv Ganga Charitable Trust. Kite
festival is an important celebration in Gujarat
where in people of all walks and ages y kites
passionately. However, birds become the
victims of this celebration as the thread of the
kite injures them invariably. The Veterinary
Professionals, PG Scholars and Students of nal
year BVSc & AH, SDAU thwarted the poignant
situation by treating 150 odd injured birds. Dr H
N Kher, Registrar, SDAU and Dr D V Joshi,
Dean, Veterinary College led the noble cause
arranged by Faculties of Gynaecology, Surgery
and Clinical Complex, Deesa.
Equine Show and Exhibition
SDAU participated in Equine Show and
Exhibition jointly organized by Seema Suraksha
and Jan Lok Kalyan Samiti and Department of rd Animal Husbandry, Gujarat State on 23
January, 2016 at Nadabat, Dist Banaskantha. The
event was attended by 2500 odd farmers, who
were exulted at the exhibition and fervently
interacted with the experts including Dr P M
Chauhan and Dr T V Sutariya. A video lm on
a i l m e n t s o f l i v e s t o c k a n d t h e i r
treatment/prevention was also displayed on the
occasion besides treatment of injured horses.
STUDENT'S ACTIVITIES
Sixth semester students of RE & EE College
namely Mr Jitendra Gehlot and Mr Akash
K o t h a d i a , r o m p e d h o m e i n d i s t r i c t
championship of table tennis organized under
the aegis of Khel Mahakumbh, Ministry of Sports,
Govt of Gujarat at Vidya Mandir Sports th
Complex, Palanpur on 4 February, 2016. Sixty
players enthusiastically participated in the
competition. Mr Jitendra Gehlot and Mr Akash
Kothadia each were awarded a certicate and a
cash prize of ̀ 5000.
Expert Lecture by Dr Ramsay Chaudhary, Small Animal Practitioner, USA
Dr Ramsay Chaudhary, the leading small
animal veterinary practitioner at USA visited th
SDAU on 16 February, 2016 and demonstrated
the clinical examination of dogs especially for
spraying, otoscopy, ophthalmoscopy,
ultrasonography and dental care.
Table Tennis Championship
Inter Agricultural Universities Tournament
SDAU hosted Gujarat State Inter Agricultural
Universities Kho-Kho, Kabbadi and Badminton nd rd
tournament on 22 and 23 January, 2016 that
was contested by 130 players from all the four
State Agriculture Universities. SDAU notched
the table by winning Championship of Kabbadi
and Badminton (Boys). Navsari Agricultural
University won Kho-Kho championship, while
Junagadh Agricultural University wrested the
Badminton (Girls) championship.
A versatile team of SDAU comprising 22
students from different faculties participated in
the All India Agriculture University Cultural
and Literacy Competition “Agriunifest – 2016 st th
held at Bhuwneshwar on 1 -4 February, 2016.
The SDAU team won the rst prize in Mime
representing message of humanity and kindness
to the current society abysmally down with
unrest. Forty-ve national teams from different
agricultural universities across the country
participated in Agriunifest-2016. Hon Vice
Chancellor Prof (Dr) Ashok A Patel praised and
congratulated the students for their performance.
Educational Tour
Collegiate and Inter-polytechnics Athletics Meet
College of Veterinary Science & Animal
Husbandry, SDAU hosted the Inter-collegiate thand Inter-polytechnics Athletics Meet on 18 -
th19 February, 2016. One hundred and seven
contestants from 8 different colleges and 6
polytechnics of the SDAU participated with
élan in the event. Mr Ashish K Chaudhary
(CPCA) and Ms Vaibhaviben Nayi (Home Science)
were declared as best Athlete in men and women
categories of colleges, respectively. In Polytechnic
segment, Mr Piyush J Solanki (Agri. Polytechnic,
Deesa) and Ms Vandnaben Parmar (Agri.
Polytechnic, Amirgadh) were the Best Athlete in
men and women categories, respectively.
Agriunifest-2016
The Department of Genetics and Plant
Breeding, CPCA organized a day Practical th
Educational Tour for 4 Semester students to
different research stations of SDAU. They
were conducted to Wheat Research Station,
Vijapur; Tobacco Research Station, Ladol and
Seed Spices Research Station, Jagudan to
abreast the students of pragmatic execution of
breeding activities in those crop.
Thalessemia Camp
College of Horticulture in association with
Indian Red Cross Society, Gujarat State,
Ahmedabad and Seth B R Polytechnic in
H o r t i c u l t u r e , J a g u d a n , o r g a n i z e d a th
Thalessemia diagnosis camp on 29 February,
2016. Ninety students, ofcials and staff
membrs were examined and were abreasted
with the causes and consequences of the
disease.
EXTENSION ACTIVITIES
District level farmer Seminar
The district level farmers' seminar on
“Bijmasala pako : Utpadan, Mushkelio ane
Nirakaran” was organized by the Seed Spices
thResearch Station, Jagudan on 29 January, 2016.
Six hundred odd progressive farmers of the
Mehsana, Patan and Banaskantha districts
Scientic trainings on burning issues that
fraught agriculture like pink boll worm in
cotton, cultivation of mustard and wheat were
organized by the Agricultural Research
Station, Adiya at Adiya and APMC, Harij on th th th
18 – 20 and 30 January, 2016, respectively.
Use of sulphur fertilizers to harvest better
economic returns in mustard crop was delved
in details. Ginners were given hands on
training to stop spreading of pink boll worm
from gin to farmers' eld by adopting sanitary
measures like burning cotton waste and to clean
9
Brain storming session on “Pollination in Date palm”
A brain storming session on scientic
pollination of Date palm was organized by the
Date palm Research Station, SDAU, Mundra
in collaboration with Indian Date palm
Society, Adani Foundation and KVK, Mundra thon 26 February, 2016. The event was attended
by progressive farmers, representatives from
NGOs, ofcia ls f rom Department of
H o r t i c u l t u r e , R e p r e s e n t a t i v e s f r o m
biotechnological rms engaged in tissue
cul ture of Date palm. A sc int i l la t ing
PowerPoint presentation was done by Dr C M
Muralidharan, I/c Station that invited
interesting discussion from progressive
farmers on indigenous techniques adopted
tradit ional ly by farmers for ef fect ive
pollination.
Scientic Trainings on Burning Issues that Fraught Agriculture
equipments and machineries and spray
chemicals after ginning of cotton. They were also
advised to use pheromone traps in gins to trap
males and thereby break mating cycle. The
farmers were advised not to sow cotton very
early, adopt early varieties to terminate the life
cycle early, and the ginners to complete ginning
well before the seeding of next crop for checking
the suicidal generations of pink boll worm. The
major part of the training emphasized on
selection of appropriate varieties as per sowing
time, use of nutrition as per soil health card in
general and basal application of zinc sulphate
and ferrous sulphate fertilizers in wheat for
realizing higher production and better grain
quality. Soil and water being the cardinal natural
base, farmers were exhorted to adopt micro
irrigation system for judicious use of Narmada
canal water so as to avoid deterioration of soil
health due to over use of water.
participated in the event. The seminar was
inaugurated by Prof (Dr) Ashok Patel, Hon
Vice Chancellor, SDAU in presence of Dr M S
Patel and Sh Sonaji Chauhan, Members of
BOM, SDAU, Dr R R Shah, Director of
Research, Dr K A Thakkar, DEE and Dr M R
Prajapati, Dean (Agri), SDAU. Hon Vice
Chancellor led the team of scientists in guiding
the farmers for enhanced production and quality
of seed spices. Technical session comprised latest
technologies on varietal development, crop
production and crop protection. The farmers
took keen interest in organic production of seed
spices, bio-control of pest and diseases and post
harvest management. A Booklet on “Calendar of
Operations for Seed Spices Crops “was also
released on the occasion.
Training on production of pulses and seed spices
Dry Farming Research Station, Radhanpur,
SDAU organized trainings on, “Improved
Crop Production Technologies in Pulses”,
“Production Technologies of Spices”, “
Protable Arid Fruit-Ber” and “Scientic
Cultivation of Castor and Mustard” at
Kamalpur, Satun village, Nani Pimpli and thGotarka village of Radhanpur Taluka on 6 ,
th th rd8 , 12 and 23 January, 2016, respectively. Two
hundred farmers including rural farm women
actively interacted to use no/low cost
agricultural technologies to get better prot in
pulses crops, integrated nutrient management in
seed spices as well as low cost agricultural
technologies to get more prot in Castor-
Mustard and “Ber-A Protable Arid Fruit Crop”.
10
DISTINGUISHED VISITORS
Director, ICAR-CIAH, Bikaner Applauds Date palm Research
· Dr S K Sharma PC, AICRP on Arid Zone
Fruits visited Date palm Research Station, th th
Mundra during 11 -13 January, 2016 to
review the research on Date palm being
conducted at Mundra. Dr Sharma
appreciated the work being carried out at
Mundra and complimented the incredible
efforts of the center to establish date palm
eld gene repository; one of the richest
collections in India.
· Dr Neeta Singh, Principal Scientist,
Division of Germplasm Conservation,
NBPGR, New Delhi, visited Pulse Research
thStation on 29 January, 2016 for monitoring
of NBPGR project.
· Zonal monitoring team of All India
C o o r d i n a t e d W h e a t a n d B a r l e y
Improvement Project comprising Dr P C
Mishra, JNKVV, Powerkheda; A P
Agraval, IIWBR, Karnal; Pramod Prasad,
IIWBR, Shimla and C N Mishra, IIWBR,
Karnal visited Wheat Research Station, t hVijapur on 14 February, 2016 for
monitoring of wheat coordinated trials and
nurseries.
· National monitoring team of Directorate
o f R a p e s e e d - M u s t a r d R e s e a r c h
comprising Dr K H Singh, Principal
Scientist, Dr O P Premi, Principal
Scientist from ICAR-DRMR, Bharatpur
and Dr Navin Singh, Senior Scientist from
IARI, New Delhi, visited Castor-Mustard th
Research Station on 10 February, 2016.
They were impressed to see well executed
breeding, agronomical and screening trials
against wilt. They also conducted to
breeder seed plots and FLD's.
SEMINAR/CONFERENCE/SYMPOSIUM/GROUP MEETS/TRAINING
· Dr B S Deora, Professor, Centre for Natural th
Resources Management attended the 50
Annual Convention of the Indian Society
of Agricultural Engineers' Symposium on
“Agricultural Engineering in Nation
Building: Contribution and Challenges' th
followed by 29 Annual Convention of
Agricultural Engineers of the Institution of
Engineers (India) on 'Agro-Tech Industries:
Status, Scope and Strategies for Food
Security' held at OUAT, Bhubaneswar and th stAAU, Anand on 19 - 21 January, 2016 and
th st20 - 21 February, 2016, respectively. Dr
Deora was conferred the prestigious Fellow
award of the Indian Society of Agricultural
Engineers (ISAE).
· Dr A U Amin, Prof S P Patel, Dr S M Patel
and Dr N R Patel participated in National
s e m i n a r o n “ N e w D i m e n s i o n a l
Approaches for Enhancement of Seed
Spices Productivity and Protability under
nd rdera of Climate Change” at NRCSS, on 2 -3
February, 2016. The poster entitled
“Assurance against failure: Cumin + Ajwain
intercropping” was awarded as best poster
in the event.
· Dr S I Patel, Associate Research Scientist (Pl
Patho) participated as a member in the
zonal monitoring team constituted by
ICAR-Indian Institute of Wheat and Barley
Research, Karnal to monitor the eld trials,
nurseries and special trials conducted at
Powerkheda, Indore, Banswara, Udaipur th thand Kota during 16 -19 February, 2016.
· Dr P J Patel, Assistant Research Scientist
(Plant Breeding), SDAU, presented QRT
Report of AICRP on Mustard from 2010-11
to 2014-15 at ICAR-Directorate of
Rapeseed-Mustard Research (DRMR), thSEWAR, Bharatpur on 29 February, 2016,
under the chairmanship of Dr B L Jalali, Ex
Director of Research, CCSHAU, Hisar, with
Dr M C Lodha (Biochemist), Dr G S Saharan
(Plant Pathologist) and Dr R C Bakhetia
(Agril. Entomology) as members of QRT
and Dr Dhiraj Singh, Director DRMR and Dr
V V Singh, as member secretary.
11
FODDER FOR THOUGHT
The world is talking about development and technological transformation for making human life economically and ergonomically more comfortable and safe. Good agricultural pract ices are the fountainheads of a l l development and if otherwise are the root causes of all devastations. With so much information easily available, does it make technology savvy generation smarter than the generations before who are not so adept to ICTs? The research indicates that though the technology savvy generation have lost the ability for oral memorization possessed by our ancestors when writing was invented, but they have gained additional skills of accessing, analyzing and using information better in lesser time. In this backdrop, would it not be appropriate to foresee how the development of technologies and farm management would be impacted by so called perceptions of Google Generation?
Whatever agriculture we practice today is the manifestation of cumulative experience of thousands of farmers over thousands of years acquired under trying conditions. Think of the excitement when the farmer has come across and selected wheat or rice plants among the rafter of grass species that had been growing wildly under natural condit ions. Imagine the exhilaration of the farmer when he had dug the soil for the rst time and had sown some seeds or for the matter the thrill he had got when the sown seed had borne owers and had set seeds. The best products and practice were selected by him to arrive at present agricultural practices. Everything he acquired was by observing, learning, practicing, gaining experience and retaining the best of his experiences for posterity. Now, imagine the imminent changes in agriculture where plants, soil, aquifer, and consummated inputs requirements will be communicated to the farmer through computer and sensors. There will be drones, there will robots and there will Aadhar based cadastral maps imbedded with different models for technology driven agriculture. Wow! Doesn't it sound like that the farmer will be totally transformed; and transformed more than the state of agriculture? He will acquire more skill in controlling and managing the technologies rather than learning how to till the land with bullocks. As such, eld operations might be replaced with sensors for data collections, human with articial intelligence and the f a r m e r s o f f u t u r e a r e s o m e t h i n g l i k e
scientists/technicians without any physical presences in the farm. And this will happen without even an iota of doubt that the availability, access and affordability to safe, nutritious and healthy food, equitable distribution of agri-food system, sustainable use of natural base, adoption and mitigation of climatic change; particularly for major weather aberrations, pollution, trans-boundary diseases that of late are defying boundaries of nations and species, loss of biodiversity, resilience of farming systems etc are going to aggravate.
Under the circumstances, it assumes pertinence as to what are the impending changes; and how precisely the anticipated technologies are going to impact/erode the societal values. The palpable impact would largely hinge on whether the farmer is driven by technologies or he drives the technologies; and above all taking the over-riding precaution of nonsense use of technologies that might create pernicious cyclic problems of employment and livelihoods at rural level.
It is heartening to note that Digital India is contemplating to link 535 agricultural markets for facilitating better marketing avenues to farmers with further scopes of fusion of technology, insurance and mechanization. The Aadhaar-linked cadastral records imbedded on sensing based technologies for eld operations, crop modeling and ascertain crop damage in real-time weather parameters can turn out to be a game changer. The Government of Gujarat has launched a web based "GateWay" i Khedut portal to doll out and monitor the subsidies besides disseminating technologies and information to enable the farmers to take data based decisions for practicing agriculture. These technologies will nd augmented uses for steering and supervision of both sustainable and regenerative agriculture system for what, where, when and how much resources need to be deployed as per the precise need of the soil and crops. The uses can be customized for consolidation of land holdings, precision farming, logistics mapping, farm management, geo-info map i.e. ortho images for different tasks, tools preparation, setting milestones and even for settlements of claims, traceability, sustainability, and affectivity vs efciency of decisions. However, the utility of traditional knowledge should not be forgotten in the wild race of adoption of state of art technologies. The mobile phone is the example that has made the family members under a single roof as strangers due to over indulgence with mobile gadgets.
Published by : Directorate of Research, S.D. Agricultural University, Sardarkrushinagar-385 506 Ph. : 02748-278233, 278444, Website : sdau.edu.in E-mail : [email protected]
Dr. H. B. PatelAsstt. Prof. (Pharmacology)
Dr. Piyush VermaAssoc. Prof. (Horticulture)
Dr. B. S. RathodAsstt. Research Scientist
Sh. Dhaval J. JoshiAgriculture Officer
Prof. (Dr.) Ashok A. Patel
Vice-chancellor
Dr. S. Acharya
Assoc. Director of Research
CHIEF PATRON
PATRON & CHIEF EDITOR
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