A fusion of traditional practices, management expertise and technology has taken agriculture to a higher level at a farm located in Udayampuli Village of Tirunelveli district. Jaycee Agro Farms has emerged as a model in which the farmer is in control of the food chain — from production to marketing.The farm, spread over 200 acres (and an additional 250 acre of leased land), adopts a biodiversified cropping pattern (paddy, fruits and vegetables) and is home to about 51,000 trees, all belonging to native species. It has an interconnected drip irrigation network with six percolation ponds, six open wells and 28 borewells, in addition to rainwater harvesting infrastructure. The water grid, which can be operated with an Android phone, ensures
Month: January 2019
The return of the native rice variety
R. Yuvasenthilkumar, a post-graduate in organic agriculture, near Modakurichi in Tamil Nadu, used to raise paddy varieties such as IR 20 and ADT 38 on his two-acre farm till 2012.Having developed an interest in native varieties — specifically, ones that grow without the use of fertilizers — he went on a quest for almost a year looking for such paddy varieties. He tried cultivating varieties from the delta areas. However, the yield was not satisfactory. Then, he learnt from elders in his locality that before the 1970s, they used to grow varieties such as Tiruchengode Sambha and Ayan Sambha. However, the seeds for these varieties were not available locally.In 2014, he got 50 gm of seed imported by the