“There is a drop in supply of tomato from Himachal Pradesh and Karnataka to the Delhi mandi. Farmers have planted less area under the crop as prices had crashed in May and they were unable to get even the input cost. Further, heavy rains have destroyed the crops in some parts of the country,” Ashok Kaushik, past president, Tomato Association of Azadpur mandi.Tomato prices which had crashed to Rs 1-2 per kg in May are now selling at Rs 40-50 a kg, while cauliflower, French beans, green peas and capsicum have risen 25%-30% in the past month in the Delhi and Mumbai’s wholesale markets as heavy rain has hit output, traders said.

“There is a drop in supply of tomato from Himachal Pradesh and Karnataka to the Delhi mandi. Farmers have planted less area under the crop as prices had crashed in May and they were unable to get even the input cost. Further, heavy rains have destroyed the crops in some parts of the country,” Ashok Kaushik, past president, Tomato Association of Azadpur mandi.

Supplies of tomato from Maharashtra and Karnataka to Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala have also been disrupted, after heavy rains in June after cyclone Nisarga destroyed the crop, said Vegetable Growers Association of India president Sriram Gadhave. “Farmers have replanted the seeds and we can expect prices to remain firm for the next one month,” he said

Gadhave said that prices of vegetables like capsicum, cucumber and bitter gourd have increased by 25% to 30% in the past one month. In the wholesale market of Mumbai, capsicum is being sold at Rs 55 a kg, cucumber at Rs 50 a kg, bitter gourd at Rs 45 a kg and bottle gourd at Rs 30 a kg, he said.

The fuel price hike has also contributed to the increase of the tomato and vegetable cost, said Mahinder Sanpal, a vegetable trader at Delhi’s Azadpur mandi. He said transporters were increasing the rates which was being reflected in veggie prices too. “The volatility in vegetable prices continue, especially for vegetables coming from Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Prices have increased for capsicum, cabbage and french beans by 30% in the past one month and being quoted RS 40-50 a kg. Green peas was being quoted at R 70-80 a kg in the mandi on Saturday,” he said.

Source: indiatimes.com

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The Centre has taken various steps to control locust swarms, and carried out operations in over 1.5 lakh hectares area since April 11 to prevent crop losses. “As per the instructions of Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar, continuous action is being taken to control locust swarms,” an official statement said on Saturday.

Starting from April 11 till July 9, control operations have been done in 1,51,269 hectares area in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana by Locust Circle Offices (LCOs), it added. The control operations have also been done in 1,32,660 hectares area in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Bihar by state governments.

Elaborating on the actions, the Agriculture Ministry said that in the intervening night of July 9-10, control operations were carried out at 16 places in 8 districts – Barmer, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Bikaner, Churu, Jhunjhunu, Sikar, and Karauli of Rajasthan, 2 places in Bhuj district of Gujarat and at 1 place each in Auraiya and Etawah districts of Uttar Pradesh by LCOs.

Besides this, respective state agriculture department/s also carried out control operations at 1 place in Alwar district in Rajasthan; and at 1 place each in Auraiya and Etawah districts of Uttar Pradesh against small groups and scattered population of locusts.

“Presently, 60 control teams with spray vehicles are deputed /deployed in State of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh and more than 200 Central Government personnel are engaged in locust control operations. In addition, 20 spray equipments have now been received,” the statement said.

To strengthen the control capacity, procurement of 55 additional vehicles has been done. Further, five companies with 15 drones are deployed at Barmer, Jaisalmer, Bikaner, Nagaur and Phalodi in Rajasthan for effective control of locusts on tall trees and in inaccessible areas through spraying of pesticides. A Bell helicopter has been deployed in Rajasthan for use in Scheduled Desert Area as per the need. The Bell helicopter conducted anti-locust spraying aerial spraying operation in Bhopalgarh and Shekhala area of Jodhpur.

Indian Air Force also has conducted trials in anti-locust operation by using a Mi-17 helicopter and the results are encouraging. “Swarms of immature pink locusts and adult yellow locusts are active in Barmer, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Bikaner, Churu, Jhunjhunu, Sikar, and Karauli of Rajasthan; Bhuj district of Gujarat and Auraiya and Etawah districts of Uttar Pradesh,” the statement said.

No significant crop losses have been reported in Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Haryana. However, some minor crop losses have been reported in some districts of Rajasthan. As per the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s Locust Status Update on July 3, the ministry said that many spring-bred swarms migrated to the Indo-Pak border before the monsoon rains. Some remained in the east to northern states of India and a few groups reached Nepal.

The forecast is that these swarms will return to Rajasthan with the start of the monsoon in coming days to join other swarms still arriving from Iran and Pakistan, which is expected to be supplemented by swarms from the Horn of Africa in about mid-July, it added.

Early breeding has occurred along the Indo-Pak border where substantial hatching and band formation will take place in July. This will cause the first-generation summer swarms to form in mid-August, the ministry said. Weekly virtual meet on Desert Locust of South-West Asian countries (Afghanistan, India, Iran and Pakistan) is being organised by the FAO. 15 virtual meetings of the technical officers of South West Asian countries have taken place so far.

Source: indiatimes.com

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New Delhi: Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Friday released new operational guidelines for setting up and promotion of 10,000 FPOs in the country. A Farmer Producer Organisation (FPO), formed by a group of farm producers, is a registered body with producers as shareholders of the organisation. It deals with business activities related to farm produce and works for the benefit of member producers.

The guidelines were released by Tomar during a meeting with agriculture ministers of states through video conferencing.

A total of 10,000 FPOs are to be formed in the country by 2023-24 and each FPO will be supported for five years. About Rs 6,866 crore will be spent for this purpose, an official statement quoted Tomar as saying in the meeting.

Highlighting the recent agri-reforms, the minister assured that all necessary support would be rendered to states to accelerate agriculture infrastructure development, promote FPOs and extend credit facilities to farmers through Kisan Credit Cards (KCC).

He said the Rs 1 lakh crore Agri-Infra Fund will be used for extending credit facility for setting up post-harvest infrastructure projects to reduce crop wastage.

On KCCs, the minister said there are about 6.67 crore active KCC accounts currently. A special drive has been initiated to register 2.5 crore farmers by the end of this year.

About 95 lakh applications have been received since the beginning of the drive in February, out of which 75 lakh applications have been sanctioned, he said.

Agricultural ministers of states offered their support to the Centre in implementing farm programmes and reforms announced recently, the statement added.

Ministers of State for Agriculture Parshottam Rupala and Kailash Chaudhary and senior ministry officials were also present in the meeting.

Source: indiatimes.com

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New Delhi: The government is on track to achieving the target of doubling farmers’ income by 2024 and recent farm reforms, including setting up of a Rs 1 lakh crore agri-infra fund, are steps in that direction, a senior agriculture ministry official said on Friday. The recent reforms, including three ordinances to provide barrier-free trading platforms to farmers, are aimed at addressing the post-production challenges and ensuring better returns to farmers, said Ashok Dalwai, CEO of the National Rainfed Area Authority under the agriculture ministry.

Dalwai, also the chairman of the Committee on Doubling Farmers’ Income (DFI), was speaking at a webinar organised by the India Pulses And Grains Association (IPGA).

To a query on whether the government will achieve the target of doubling farmers’ income by 2024, Dalwai said, “We are 100 per cent sure that we are in the right direction and on the right track. Certainly, you will see an increase in the farmers’ income along with more robust agricultural growth.”

Dalwai said the government’s price support scheme alone cannot give incentive to farmers.

The post-production reforms intend to give incentives to producers so that they are able to generate higher incomes by getting better remunerative prices, and simultaneously adopt new technology and management practices for higher productivity, he said.

He also said the rate of gross capital formation is directly related to the income growth. “Looking at the way the government has positively responded and made a huge investment promise now, we are on track,” he added.

On agri-reforms announced amid the COVID-19 crisis, Dalwai said the three ordinances constitute the continuous effort of the government towards liberalisation of the agriculture sector.

“The first seed of farm sector liberation was sown in 2003. Unfortunately, notwithstanding 17 years, the journey of reforms has not been steady. In the last four years, what the government has tried to do is to put reforms on a more robust track,” he said.

Post-production has been a major challenge in this country. In 1965, the government had initiated the Green Revolution for achieving higher farm productivity and meeting food security. Now, the country is in surplus, he said.

To effect necessary changes in the post-production segment, the reforms being undertaken now are similar to those in 1965, he emphasised.

“Many compare with 1991 momentum, but I would like to say this is more 1965 momentum. The 1965 reform was related to production, this is related to post-production,” he noted.

Stressing on the importance of the farm sector, he said in the 21st century it can can be the basis of a “circular economy”, where agri produce can feed not just humans and animals, but also provide raw material to industries.

The Dalwai committee, constituted in April 2016, has recommended several measures to achieve the target to double farmers’ income by 2022. The government, however, shifted the deadline to 2024 earlier this year in a booklet titled ‘Transforming India’.

On the recent amendment to the Essential Commodities Act, Additional Secretary in the Consumer Affairs Ministry Nidhi Khare said the country has lived with this act and regulations for 65 years. The ordinance has been published and very soon the bill will also come, she said.

“It is going to be our first season to basically see how markets behave and whether we are able to bring positivity into the investors, bring permanent institutions which are required for food processing and ensure farmers actually derive their fair price,” she added.

Source: indiatimes.com

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FCI has a total stock of 81.25 million tonnes as on July 8, of which wheat comprises 54.52 million tonnes and rice is at 26.72 million tonnes. New Delhi: The government’s wheat procurement has touched an all-time record of 38.98 million tonnes so far in 2020-21 marketing year (April-March), with Madhya Pradesh surpassing Punjab as the country’s biggest wheat procuring state. The previous record was 38.18 million tonnes achieved in 2012-13. Wheat procurement stood at 34.77 million tonnes during 2019-20 marketing year.

Wheat marketing year runs from April-March, but bulk of procurement is normally done in the first three months.

Wheat procurement target has been set at 40.7 million tonnes for the current year.

The state-run Food Corporation of India (FCI) and state agencies undertake purchase of wheat at minimum support price (MSP).

“We have procured 38.98 million tonnes of wheat so far. The procurement operations are almost complete in major states. Few thousand tonnes more will be brought in the next few days,” a senior FCI official told .

According to FCI’s latest data, Madhya Pradesh became the largest contributor to the central pool with 12.93 million tonnes of wheat, surpassing Punjab which procured 12.71 million tonnes.

Haryana (7.4 million tonnes), Uttar Pradesh (3.55 million tonnes) and Rajasthan (2.21 million tonnes) also made significant contributions to national procurement of wheat.

FCI has a total stock of 81.25 million tonnes as on July 8, of which wheat comprises 54.52 million tonnes and rice is at 26.72 million tonnes.

The central government had relaxed lockdown norms to start agricultural and related activities, with procurement commencing only from April 15 in most of the procuring states.

The Union Agriculture Ministry in its third estimate has pegged wheat output to reach an all-time record level of 107.18 million tonnes in the 2019-20 crop year (July-June) as against 103.60 million tonnes in the previous year.

Source: indiatimes.com

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PUNE: The Indian dairy industry is promoting use of ‘pashu ayurveda’, or ethno-veterinary medicine, to help control animal diseases and decrease the chances of pathogens jumping from them to humans, as in the case of novel coronavirus.

Cattle and buffaloes account for more than 50% of the livestock population in India, according to the latest census.

The National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) is aggressively promoting use of ethno-veterinary medicine after seeing success in a pilot project run at Sabarkantha dairy in Gujarat.

“The recent Covid-19 pandemic has turned out to be a global health crisis. In order to mitigate the risk to human health, controlling zoonotic diseases at the animal source is of paramount importance,” said Dilip Rath, chairman of NDDB.

According to the World Animal Health Organisation (OIE), 60% of the human infectious diseases across the world are zoonotic and at least 75% of emerging infections in humans are of animal origin.

In May, the government had formed a committee to work on the OneHealth concept, of which Rath is a member. The committee is working to promote multi-sectoral, trans-disciplinary approaches to promote OneHealth.

Promotion of ethno-veterinary medicine is part of the OneHealth concept, which recognises that the health of animals is closely linked with the health of humans.

“Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has also become a major concern due to indiscriminate use of antibiotics to treat animal diseases. The National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) believes that the solution to this problem lies in alternative treatment strategies like pashu ayurveda-based ECM and has started aggressively promoting it,” said Rath.

Rabies, bovine tuberculosis, bird flu, Japanese encephalitis and Covid-19 are some of the examples of diseases having zoonotic origins, which put a huge monetary burden on the public health systems.

The pilot project at Sabarkantha Milk Union and has been running for two years now. “About 80% of the animal diseases can be reduced significantly using EVM (ethno-veterinary medicine) prepared by farmers using locally available ingredients,” said N Punniamurthy, a retired veterinarian, who now trains veterinarians on use of Siddaayurveda-based ethno-veterinary medicine.

“I realised that the functional remedies prepared by traditional healers were more effective in treating animal diseases. However, different places have availability of different types of herbs and plants. So we decided to use spices, which are commonly available across the country, to prepare medicines,” he said.

Mastitis is a common and prevalent cattle disease in India, due to which farmers suffer losses worth million of rupees. The ethno-veterinary medicine solution given by Punniamurthy has become so popular that 30 milk unions in the country, including private and co-operative, have started using it.

Source: indiatimes.com

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KOCHI: India’s marine fish production recorded a marginal rise of 2.1% in 2019 from previous year at 3.56 million tonnes in total landings from across the coasts, according to the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI).

A study report on annual marine fish landings estimates in the country during the last year released here by the CMFRI showed that Tamil Nadu took the first position with 7.75 lakh tonnes followed by Gujarat at 7.49 lakh tonnes. Gujarat was holding the first position for the past few years. Kerala (5.44 lakh tonnes) retained the third position.

The data showed an unusual feature of a commercially unimportant fish becoming the most landed resource with the red toothed trigger fish (2.74 lakh tonnes) registering a huge increase in the landings across the coasts of the country. The fish has little demand in domestic markets and is mostly caught for the purpose of feed mills. . The second highest landings at national-level is ribbon fish (2.19 lakh tonnes) followed by penaeid prawns (1.95 lakh tonnes) and non-penaeid prawns (1.80 lakh tonnes).

Indian mackerel, which was in the first spot in 2018, suffered the highest setback with its landings declining by 43% during the last year. While the states such as West Bengal (55%), Andhra Pradesh (34%), Odisha (14.5%), Karnataka (11%) and Tamil Nadu (10.4%) recorded increase in the landings, the marine fish catch decreased in Maharashtra (32%), Goa (44%) and Kerala (15.4%) compared with that in the previous year, said the report.

Of eight cyclonic storms that lashed India, six turned out to be severe. Fani in April, Vayu in June, Hika in September, Kyarr in October, Maha in Oct-Nov and Bulbul in Oct-Nov adversely affected the fishing activity more on the west coast of the country.

The estimate of the value of marine fish landings based on price at landing centres across the country during 2019 was Rs 60,881 crores with 15.6% increase over 2018. At the retail level, the estimated value of marine fish was Rs. 92,356 crores (15% increase over 2018).

Source: indiatimes.com

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Benglauru / Hyderabad: When the Centre announced nationwide lockdown in the last week of March to contain the spread of Covid-19, it left several retailers engaged in the supply of essential items nervous. RS Sodhi, the indefatigable managing director of Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation, popular by its dairy brand Amul, was not one of them, though. “There will not be any problem,” he declared with an air of confidence, back then. And, he walked, or is still walking the talk as the lockdown has stretched beyond three-weeks, and parts of India, including Mumbai, are still in a gridlock.

Amul brand, along with GCMMF’s 18-member unions, touches the lives of 3.6 million farmers across about 18,700 villages of Gujarat. India’s biggest dairy brand with one million plus retail touch points required an infrastructure that can support data-intensive and demanding workloads. The cooperative giant’s faith and steady investment in latest technology over the past 10 years has helped it wither the lockdown storm with little or no pain to dairy farmers or consumers.

The diary giant says its modern servers help in tracking the milk supply chain where any delay in the processing of milk can hurt the quality of the end product. “We are probably the largest users of technology in the dairy system in the country. Right from procurement from farmers to touching the customers, it is completely touched by technology,” Sodhi told ET.

The company invests between Rs 600 crore and Rs 800 crore every year on technology that ensures technology adoption from sourcing milk from farmers; shifting to coolers, chilling the milk and ensuring that the quality is maintained and then shifting to tankers to reach out to consumers. Technology is adopted in quality, online payment to farmers, and distribution management system for vendors to book orders as well as adoption of enterprise resource planning software from SAP.

“We do more than Rs 50,000 crore business every year, without technology you cannot be in the dairy industry,” said Sodhi. The dairy mogul is using IBM’s latest servers to run its core operations and deliver milk and dairy products across the country.

Technology has been helping Amul capture data points from the last Kirana store of the network and analyze varied datasets, IBM India Director (Systems) Viswanath Ramaswamy told ET. This helps the diary giant to tweak the production of a certain product in sync with the fluctuation in market demand, with ease.

Over a period of time, many smart analytics tools have been added to the technology support infrastructure to effectively manage Amul’s supply chain, said Ramaswamy. In the coming years, the cooperatives, like many consumer product companies, will see use of artificial intelligence in order to make better decisions, he added.

Nandini, the second largest dairy brand after Amul, owned by the Karnataka Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (KMF), is in the process of a technology overhaul. “We are going in for the latest ERP technology in KMF and its units,” said BC Sateesh, managing director of KMF. Its member union Bamul in Bengaluru, for example, has adopted Oracle-based ERP. “Our district unions have been using their own software, and some are switching to modern ones,” he said. Nandini has an annual turnover of about Rs 14,000 crore, and sources milk from about nine lakh farmers across about 254,000 villages.

KMF’s Mother Dairy unit in Bengaluru, Sateesh added, has cloud-based ERP, and all its new milk processing units are end-to-end automated with Siemens technology. Tech adoption, he said, has helped in uninterrupted supply to consumers, while at the same time, farmers are relieved their milk got marketed even in a lockdown situation.

Hyderabad-based private sector diary brand, Heritage Foods, is also investing big on technology. A user of IBM infrastructure, its executive director Brahmani Nara said: “SAP integrated solution enables timely automated milk payments to village level suppliers. We have honoured hassle-free 100% milk procurement and payments to farmers.” Technology, she added, has become the backbone in maintaining business. During lockdown, the firm ensured door delivery of products, with leads captured using WhatsApp and social media.”

According to her, milk transport vehicles are monitored through GPS Solutions to ensure they reach their destination in time and to maintain consistent quality. “Technology has become the backbone in maintaining business discipline and we were able to smoothly close our annual accounts in time and adhere to all compliances, despite relaxations by the Government,” she said

Source: indiatimes.com

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Drones will, however, not replace traditional methods of locust control, which are still cheaper.Bengaluru: The Department of Agriculture is looking for drones that can fly at night and stay airborne for an extended duration, as it seeks to expand use of unmanned aerial vehicles to fight off locust swarms that have invaded India’s western and central region.

The broad specification comes a little over one month after India’s civil aviation regulator granted the agriculture ministry conditional exemption to use drones in anti-locust operations, making India the first country to do so.

It also comes ahead of the start of monsoon season in Rajasthan and surrounding regions, where desert locusts will migrate to over the next few weeks to breed and lay their eggs.

Over the weekend, locust swarms descended upon Gurugram, with parts of Delhi also put on high alert.

“Locusts are most inactive after sunset, so it makes sense to spray at night. We are also in talks with manufacturers who have drones that are powered by fuel, so they can stay airborne for a longer duration,” said Atish Chandra, joint secretary, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, Department of Agriculture.

The ministry of agriculture is currently processing the expanded list of requirements and it will seek permissions from the civil aviation ministry soon.

Though a fairly small deployment, with just a dozen drones in operation and another dozen soon to be deployed, the agriculture department has found them to be invaluable in spraying the tops of tall trees and for their ability to reach inaccessible areas. Drones will, however, not replace traditional methods of locust control, which are still cheaper.

Source: indiatimes.com

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In just one week, the area under cultivation has gone up from 13.13 million hectares to 31.56 million hectares.New Delhi: Crop planting this season has more than doubled from last year with the early advance of the southwest monsoon and heavy showers speeding up agricultural activity in the country.

The biggest increase is in oilseeds, under which area has gone up by more than six times. The area under pulses has increased by up to three times. Central India, which has received the heaviest rainfall in the country this season, is a major area for these crops.

Area under rice, the main kharif crop, has increased by 34% while that under coarse cereals, including bajra and maize, has gone up by almost 100%.

In just one week, the area under cultivation has gone up from 13.13 million hectares to 31.56 million hectares.

“Monsoon is advancing well and reaching most of the states before schedule. We are well prepared with enough seeds and fertilisers to help farmers in planting well in time. We expect bumper crop this year,” said S K Malhotra, agriculture commissioner. “The effect of Covid-19 pandemic is not visible in agriculture sector.”

The government has set a target of 149.92 million tonnes of food grain production in the current kharif season and 148.4 million tonnes in the rabi (winter sown) season, taking total food grains target to a record 298.3 million tonnes in the 2020-21crop year.

Source: indiatimes.com

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