Only irrigation source, a puddle, has come to the rescue of farmers who are cultivating groundnut and raising casuarina plantations in a stretch of agricultural fields along the coastline in Krishna district.
High saline content in the ground water has been the inevitable hurdle for the farmers to adopt diversified crops and thus the contribution of agriculture produce from the coastline mandals in the district was marginal. Relying on the puddle, the farmers have extensively planted the casuarina saplings and those having investment capacity preferred to grow the groundnut.
Digging up a puddle, which can irrigate 3 cents of land, requires a manual labour instead of using any machine. “At least 30-40 puddles are required to grow casuarina in an acre. Having a depth of five feet at some places to below five meters, the quantity of saline content in the water from the puddle can be reduced and thus the plants or crops are surviving,” say farmers from Peddareddi Palem in Machilipatnam rural.
As puddle came to the rescue of small and marginal farmers, they have also started producing vegetables in the recent years by tapping the fertility of the soil to the maximum. Once barren lands on the outskirts of the town have now turned into green fields and farmers are seen engaged on the fields, reaping profits with the available irrigation source.
