Tamil Nadu Agricultural University here proposed to set up four regional pesticides residue testing labs in four locations in the State, its Vice-Chancellor P. Murugesa Bhoopathi said on Wednesday.
Since the only pesticide residue testing lab functioning in the University was not sufficient to meet the requirements of the entire State, TNAU would identify and set up labs in the four regions, Mr. Bhoopathi said.
He was inaugurating a two-day national training camp on production, post harvest and marketing of Guava, here.
The cost of each lab would be about Rs. 50 lakh and the university would soon submit the proposal to the State government in this regard, he said.
Because of easy cultivation, high nutritive value and popularity of the processed products, guava played an important role in the International trade as well as local markets, he said.
Stating that guava was grown in India in an area of 1.78 lakh hectares with a total production of 19.8 lakh tonnes, Mr. Bhoopathi said it was known to tolerate extremes of temperature, hot winds, less rainfall, salinity, poor soils and also grown under waterlogged conditions.
The eight-day training is offered as part of Indian Council for Agricultural Research project ‘Value chain on mango and guava for domestic and export market’. About 100 farmers, processors and traders were attending the meet.
