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Success Story of Smt. Chenamma: Innovative Vegetable Farmer, Karnataka

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Landholding: 7 acres (Irrigated 3.5 acres: Rainfed 1.5 acre & agro-forestry (Eucalyptus) 2 acre), Antarahalli, Tubegere Hobli, DoddaballapuraTaluk, Bangalore Rural District

Education and Experience: S.S.L.C., Working as resource person for NDDB Project and having 10 year experience in the field of agriculture & horticulture. At the same time she runs and monitors a Self Help Groups in her village. She started growing vegetables namely French Beans, Tomato, Peas, Radish, Brinjal, Chilli & Green Leafy vegetables since 2006. Earlier they used to grow field crops like ragi, jowar and sunflower.

She is growing improved French Beans varieties of Indian Institute of Horticultural Research, Bangalore (ArkaSuvidha, ArkaKomal&ArkaAnoop). All the three varieties were grown in Antarahalli, TubegereHobli, Doddaballapura at her farm for past three years. The yield (Avg. 3 years) and economic details are given below.

 

Sl. No.

Crop

Varieties

Yield (t/ha)

Net Returns (Rs./ ha)

1.

French Beans

ArkaKomal*

16.5 ton/ha

1,40,000

2.

French Beans

ArkaAnoop*

17.4 ton/ha

1,49,000

3.

French Beans

ArkaSuvidha**

16.7 ton/ha

1,58,700

* Rs. 10 for Arka Komal and Arka Anoop ** Rs. 11 for Arka Suvidha

 

The area where Ms. Chennamma practices horticulture is predominantly a horticultural area. The yield of French beans which is realized, ranged from 16.5 – 17.4 t/ha is the highest in the near by villages. ArkaSuvidha variety fetched more price in market as it is a stringless variety. Whenever labour problem is there harvesting can be done even after a gap of upto 5 days as the fruits of this variety does not loose its quality. Yield wise ArkaAnoop is found to be the best. They could get 6,960 Kg /acre which was also resistant to important diseases like rust and bacterial blight. She got a market price of about Rs.11/Kg for ArkaSuvidha compared to ArkaAnoop and ArkaKomal (where she fetched Rs.10/Kg). She now prefers to grow ArkaAnoop and ArkaSuvidha because of their additional qualities and high yield.  According to farmer ArkaAnoop and ArkaSuvidha are having good cooking quality.ArkaSuvidha fetches higher price in the market because it is stringless and is preferred by working women.

Market Integration: Earlier Smt. Chennamma as a small time farmer used to bring her vegetables for sale at important markets of Bangalore. Once she started growing in large scale and neighbouring vegetable vendors came to know about her produce and quality of the vegetable grown in the field of Ms. Chennamma. Hence the vendors come to her place and purchase the produce. She has also motivated other farmers in village and neighbouring village also.

Interaction with IIHR: The seeds of improved varieties were provided for demonstrations by the IIHR during the year 2005. After knowing the performance of these varieties Ms. Chenamma visited and interacted with Scientist of IIHR and procured the seeds. She started growing improved varieties from 2006 and she is realizing continuously higher yields. Ms. Chenamma was constantly in touch with extension division of IIHR and as a follow up, extension scientist visited her field regularly. She has been provided with all the need based knowledge & skill, which included Enrichment of fertilizer and Pest Management by Dr.M.R.Hegde and Dr.Saju George, scientists of IIHR.

Innovativeness: Ms. Chennamma is hard working farmer and she is able to grasp the technologies faster and adopt it. She is actively involved in all day to day working of the farm and marketing. She is can now identify important insect pest of French bean, including stem fly and their management practices. After seeing the potential of the new variety, Ms. Chennamma has taken up seed production in the current year. The seeds so generated were supplied to the neighbouring farmers. She was also found to actively guide other farmers in adoption of new technologies. With her intervention they have started to grow different vegetable crops in a season in the village and as a result they are realizing better price in the market.

Use of Organic formulations: In case of Peas and Tomato she is now using Panchagavya during the flowering stage, according to her it was found effective in control of flower drop.

Panchagavya is made out of 5 Kg of Cow dung, 10 litre of Cow Urine, 1 litre Curds, 1 litre Milk, 1 Kg Ghee kept for 15 days while spraying mixed formulation at he rate of 1:10 ratio (Panchagavya : Water)

Use of Vegetable Special: During here visit to IIHR she came to know about the vegetable special for the tomato, beans other vegetables. The recommended dosage of vegetable special for tomato is 75 grams in 15 litres of water along with 1 shampoo sachet and 2 medium sized lemons. For French Beans it is 2 grams per litre. She is now using vegetable special regularly as she has noticed that the fruit quality, diseases resistance of the plant is improved. It also helps in retaining more number of flowers, thus increase in the fruit set leading to higher yield.

Use of Bio-fertilizer & Bio-pesticides: For enrichment of soil she started using both bio-fertilizer (Phosphate Solubilizing Bacteria (PSB), Azospirillum &Azotobacter) and bio-pesticides (Pseudomonas fluoresces, Paecilomyceslilacinus&Pochoniachlamydospria)

New varieties being tried by her: She is also started growing other improved varieties like Brinjal: ArkaAnand (a hybrid green long Brinjal from IIHR, resistant to bacterial wilt), Chilli: ArkaMeghana and ArkaShweth

The key to her success seems to her eagerness to learn and understand very soon, hard work & positive attitude. She is a model lady farmer.