ICAR-CIARI team visits Andaman & Nicobar villages, interact with farming community

The team appealed to the farming community to adopt advanced methods of farming practices with special emphasis on organic farming.

Palm trees at an Organic Agriculture Farm of the Andaman and Nicobar government at Sippighat near Port Blair, Andaman. File

A team of ICAR-CIARI, Port Blair — led by its director, Dr. Eaknath B. Chakurkar and other scientists — visited villages in the union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands and interacted with the farming community, an official release said.

During the field visit, the team appealed to the farmers to adopt advanced methods of farming practices with special emphasis on organic farming.

While earlier the focus was to attain self sufficiency for the island, the situation has changed in recent years. Due to the impact of climate change and changing scenario of the agriculture practices, the focus now is to make self sufficiency by enhancing the productivity without disturbing the fragile ecosystem.

The director told the villagers to ensure availability of feed ingredients and fodders by promoting cultivation locally and maintaining parent stocks of broilers for reducing transporting cost on feeds and chicks, value addition and packaging of spices and coconut.

The horticulture based integrated farming system of the Islands has enormous potential for providing livelihood options and can play a significant role in supporting agro-tourism based economy, he said.

On August 18, the team visited farmers under the Beodanabad panchayat and advised the villagers on coconut based farming system including ponds, polyhouse, fruits, vegetables, spices.

The following day, the team interacted with the farming community of Guptapara village and witnessed rice production with application of nano urea. The team also witnessed climate resilient pond based integrated farming system at fields.

The director assured the farming community that, ICAR-CIARI, Port Blair and its KVKs (Krishi Vigyan Kendras) are always ready to render the farmers with technical support for their socio-economic upliftment.

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research - Central Island Agricultural Research Insitute (ICAR-CIARI) provides a research base to improve the productivity of important agriculture, horticulture, livestock and fishery sector of Andaman and Nicobar Islands through adoptive, basic and strategic research.