The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Ray of hope for cane farmers

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Wednesday, May 06, 2009
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Ray of hope for cane farmers

Special Correspondent

ICRISAT and WWF partner to bring out Sustainable Sugarcane Initiative manual

HYDERABAD: At a time when sugarcane farmers and industry are going through a crisis because of high demand for water, rising cost of cultivation and low yields and productivity, a new technology of Sustainable Sugarcane Initiative (SSI) is being offered as a solution.

The International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) have partnered together to explore options for ‘Improving water productivity in agriculture’. After their success with paddy, they extended successful methods and practices for achieving ‘more with less’ through SSI to sugarcane.

The ICRISAT –WWF project also brought out SSI manual which was released by ICRISAT Director General William Dar here on Tuesday.

Dr.Biksham Gujja, team leader of the project, said SSI would increase the profitability of farmers significantly and benefit the sugar industry in terms of good quality and recovery.

Importantly, it would reduce quantity of inputs for farmers - water, fertilizer, seed material and improve the productivity of water, land and labour. Dr. Biksham said agriculture methodology should radically change for increasing productivity with less water and other inputs. Demonstration sugarcane farms had been set up in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Orissa, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu and in Andhra Pradesh, it is already being practiced by some progressive farmers.

Dr. Dar said SSI was the solution when world was impacted by climate change and water was becoming a scarce resource. Punjab Agriculture Minister Sucha Singh said the new method solved the problem of low productivity.

A progressive farmer from Zaheerabad of Medak, Panduranga Reddy, who is practicing SSI method, said he was confident of getting 60 to 70 tonnes an acre against normal yield of 25 tonnes. Prabhakar Reddy, president, AP Farmers Federation, advocated mechanisation in farming practices.

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