Indian Farmer's Phase of Entrepreneurship

While there have been consistent reports of farmers committing suicides in several parts of the country – primarily because of their inability to pay debts for high end farming resources, there is also the emerging facet of the Indian farmers this time around. Interestingly, many farmers are breaking away from their bondage with the society as mere suppliers and now are becoming their own masters – in terms of adopting farmer-entrepreneurship.

On one hand there has been a growing initiative on the part of institutes like IARI (Indian Agricultural Research Institute, also called Pusa Institute) that has led the farmers to turn over a new leaf by becoming more enterprising. And this was not to happen in a jiffy. They had to create awareness, involve the farmers in producing seeds germinating into crop varieties, and above all improve the availability of quality seed while disseminating the necessary skills and technology. And this sort of initiative has boosted the farmers to make seed production a lucrative business and enrich their own lives.

Interestingly, however, such programmes have widely been extended in the northern states of the country. Majority of the northern states like Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, have benefited from the initiative. The farmers have been provided overall guidance at every stage. And all this mentoring is done free with some initial payment and royalty from private seed companies with whom IARI signed MoUs and entailing which the companies help multiplying the Pusa variety seeds. And as a result the participating farmers augmented the total output of Pusa crop variety seeds from nearly 5000 quintals in 2005-06 to over 11000 quintals in 2009-10, as reported elsewhere.

On the other hands we have stories of men like Dyaneshwar Bodke who quit their regular jobs and the prime source of income after their new-found interest in farming especially as he was inspired by yet another farmer in Sangli who made Rs. 12 lakh a year simply by growing carnations. Dyaneshwar’s initiative blossomed so well that now his farming has grown into a producing company that grows and exports exotic flowers and fruits.

These instances show that there is an emerging segment of educated farmers whose entrepreneurial inclinations have been brought to the attention of the governmental authorities to formulate policies and lay guidelines so as to enable men like Bodke and other farmers to follow their dreams. And indeed the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) have helped Bodke’s initiative and bodies like Small Farmers’ Agri-Business Consortium (SFAC) have identified the urgency to promote agricultural producer companies and plans to set up more 250 companies around the country in near future.

Now what do we learn here? It does sound like a good deviation from the suicidal stories of our farmer brothers. But this has been made possible only by some solid backing who were instrumental in coaching the farmers, the supporting companies, and more so the enthusiasm of the farmers too. But the light is yet to be passed on to our brothers in rest parts of the country. But this is to happen soon, the movement must march as a renaissance and save the food-providers before they take away their own lives for once.

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Customer Reach

Given the large farming done in India Nuziveedu Seeds supply a major quantity of seed required by the farmer to produce more to feed the growing population. Therefore to meet the requirement and to increase marketing channel efficiency we have strategized multiple distribution network as follows

1. Own distribution network
2. Subsidiary distribution network
3. Partners(Co-partners and co-marketers) distribution network
   

By investing in multiple distribution network we are much close to farmers. Therefore we are in a much more better condition to cater our customer needs. Given that the large fragmented customer base as their needs are different, we take proper care to serve their needs and to satisfy each and every customer.
We also take personal interest to take care of our channel partners (distributors and dealers) for the proper functioning of distribution network.
Nuziveedu Seeds equally treat our global customer and understand their need based on different agro-climatic, agronomic practices and food habit and supply right product in right quantity and right place.

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Season Ending Ceremony in Kompally and Karimnagar Processing Plants

On 2nd July 2013 our Kompally plant season closing function took place at Mandava Cold Storage premises. Around 900 staff and workers attended the function. Staff from our other plants also attended to this function. Felicitation meeting took place after the lunch at 2.30 P.M. Shri. D.V. Rangarao presided the function and G.M. Processing Shri. Katti Lakshmi Narasimha accompanied with him. G.M.-SCM Shri. Rama Mohan Prasad gave the speech on difficulties faced during the season and timely arrangement of packing material etc and support given by our staffs to meet out these kind of challenges. Mr. T. Srinivas and Mr. Ch. Rama Krishna of logistics dept. praised that it is the team work which made possible the required materials reaching to the market at the right time and right place. Mr. V.B. Siva Prasad (Sr Manager, HR & IR) explained about provident fund and other social security benefits provided by the company to the employees. The meeting ended with vote of thanks given by Mr. K.Ravi (Sr Officer-HR).
Similarly the Annual Closing season taken place in Karimnagar Plant on 5th July, 2013. The function was addressed by Sri DV Ranga Rao (Head-SCM) and other senior executives followed by lunch and gift distribution ceremony.

Tomato - How to Grow

How to Grow

Preparation of Soil

• Tomato is grown in many types of soils from sand o heavy clay. A well-drained, fairly light fertile loam with a fair moisture holding capacity is ideal for growing a good crop of tomato. Good texture of the soil is of primary importance. Even poor and medium quality land produces good early crop, if managed properly.
• Tomato crop prefers a soil reaction ranging from pH 6.0 to 7.0. In acidic soils, liming was beneficial.
• Tomato is planted in well pulverized and leveled field.
  

Sowing

• About 400 to 500 g seeds are normally needed for raising crop in one hectare. The seed quantity varies with season and region of cultivation.
• In North India for spring-summer crop, the seeds are sown in late November and transplanted in second fortnight of January. In area where frost does not occur, only one sowing is done in July-August with transplanting in August-September. For autumn crop in North India, seeds are sown in July-August and transplanted in August-September. In hilly areas, seeds are sown in March-April with transplanting in April-May.
• Seed treatment with hydrogen peroxide (0.2 to 0.6 percent) for 2 to 4 days at 21°C gave an early emergency of seedlings by 7 to 8 days and also yielded 22.8 percent higher yield.
• Tomato is normally planted in raised beds of 60 to 75 cm width.
  

Fertilizer application

• Apply FYM at 20-25t ha-1 and fertilizers 100N, 50 P2O5, 50 K2O kg ha-1
• Per ha 150 kg N, 25kg P2O5 and
  

Irrigation

• Frequency of irrigation depends on the nature of the soil.
• Light soils need frequent (weekly) irrigations than heavy soils (10-15days).
• Plants should not be subjected to stress during flowering.
• Double ring method of irrigation is ideal. Drip irrigation greatly economises the irrigation water.
  

Crop Management

• Pest – Shoot and fruit borers- Spray carbaryl 50 W.P @ 2.5g l-1 quinalphos @ 2.0ml l-1 or endosulfan @ 2.0 ml l-1 or monocrotophos @ 1.6ml l-1 or carbaryl @ 3.0g l-1. Repeat the spraying on need basis.
• Spray dimethoate @ 2.0ml or methyl-o-dememton @ 2.0ml monocrotophos @ 1.5ml or triazophos 1.5ml l-1 of water.
• Diseases- Damping off (Tomato) -Raise the nursery in raised seed beds. Treat the seed with thiram or captan @ 3g kg-1. Drench the bed with bordeaux mixture 5ml or coper oxychloride @ 3g l- Early blight (Tomato)
  
  Spray mancozeb @ 3g l-1 twice at 15 days interval.
  
  Little leaf of brinjal (MLO disease)
  
  Remove and destroy the infected plants.
  

Harvesting, Storage and Drying

• The harvesting of fruits can be done at an interval of 5 days during the morning hours to prevent the weight loss.
• Yield: 20 – 25 t/ha
• For long distance transport, the fruits are harvested at the mature green stage when the cream colour starts at the bottom. Tomatoes for local and near by markets are harvested at the breaker or ripe stage when the blossom end turns pinkish or reddish. At the fully ripe stage, the surface is pink or red and this is suited for canning purposes. The fruits are to be cleaned, sorted and graded. The fruits are then packed in wooden boxes or cartons.
  

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