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To bring second Green Revolution, agri students must come to forefront
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Saturday, 11 February, 2017, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Our Bureau, New Delhi
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Delivering the 55th convocation address of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)-Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) in New Delhi, Radha Mohan Singh, minister of agriculture and farmers’ welfare, said that to bring the second Green Revolution in the country, students trained in agriculture must come to the forefront and devote their knowledge and skills to agriculture and farmers’ welfare.
He added, “Due to the presence of Pusa Institute in Delhi, there has been continuous development of agriculture in the adjoining states like Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh and due to this reason, two more IARIs have been opened in Assam and Jharkhand, through which the holistic development of agriculture is taking place in the entire country.”
Singh said, “Due to adoption of crop varieties developed by Pusa Institute, meaningful and multiple changes have been observed. Earlier, we were dependent on other countries for food grains, but now we are helping other countries by providing food security.”
The agriculture minister applauded the agricultural scientists of the country, particularly the scientists of the institute, for this achievement.
Singh said that with the cultivation of wheat varieties developed by IARI in 10 million hectares, 50 million tonnes of wheat were being produced. Basmati rice contributes about Rs 22,000 crore to the agricultural export exchequer of about one lakh crore rupees. In this, the contribution of Basmati varieties developed by Pusa Institute is about 90 per cent.
During 2016, IARI has released eleven varieties of different field crops such as rice, wheat, mustard and pulses.
Pusa Double Zero Mustard 31, a canola-quality mustard, developed by the institute, is the first variety of high quality in the country having less than two per cent erucic acid and less than 30 parts per million (ppm) glucosinolates found in oil cake, which is conducive for human and animal health.
Singh raised the hope that a state-of-the-art automated phenomics facility established by IARI would be useful to study the environmental stress.
He said that this facility would be used in developing plants from which a higher yield could be secured with less use of water and fertilisers.
Singh said that ICAR-IARI, Pusa has developed an innovative, eco-friendly and cost-effective wastewater treatment technology through which waste water can be easily made pollution free and useful for irrigation purpose with less than one per cent energy and less than 50-60 per cent investment and operational cost.
The minister said, “This technology would be effective in checking the shortage of water and pollution of soil, ground water and food due to wastewater in future.”
He said that under the leadership of prime minister Narendra Modi, a number of agricultural and farmers’ welfare schemes had been stated to strengthen rural livelihood security, besides promotion of food production.
The Prime Minister Crop Insurance Scheme, the Prime Minister Agricultural Irrigation Scheme, the Farm Mechanisation Mission, National Agricultural Marketing, the Rural Storage Scheme and the Soil Health Card Scheme, are a few to mention.
Trilochan Mohapatra, secretary, ICAR, dignitaries, scientists, students and innovative farmers were present on the occasion.
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