Sailing on unpredictable seas and working 24×7, Pankaj Pathak earned a lucrative monthly pay package of Rs 2.5 lakh. Yes, the money was flowing in. From 2002 until 2013, the merchant navy officer’s life followed a monotonous routine for months on end. But those who see the glamour of a merchant navy’s life, fail to see the intense work pressure it comes with.

Are you a novice farmer? Here’s some composters you can use to generate manure for your kitchen garden. 

“Life on the sea is extremely fast-paced. We worked like machines. Away from home, without seeing the face of your loved ones for long duration, your comrades are your only support. It can be difficult, working and living with the same set of people; in many ways cut off from the rest of the world,” shares Pankaj.

Back home, his family owned a piece of land in their village of Malhari in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh. Unfortunately, a landslide in 1986 had left it deserted and barren. Whenever he got a furlough, he would unwind by puttering around the field, trying to revive it.

His interest in his land took a serious turn in 2003, when he decided to begin farming with the help of his friend, Chander Pratap Singh. But since chemical farming was a widely accepted and practiced method, he began with that.

Though he contributed whenever he took a leave, the realisation that farming was where his heart lay came over a period of time.

Finally, after nine years as a merchant navy officer, he decided to quit his job and turn to organic farming.

Why organic farming, you may ask.

“Chemical farming in our area was so mainstream that we never gave any thought to any alternative or traditional method that existed. We doused our land with chemicals in the greed for better production, and while it did give a good yield in the initial years, after a while, the production kept reducing. The chemical had poisoned our land.”

In 2011, when he quit his high-paying job to toil in the land, his parents, both retired teachers, were hesitant. They didn’t fully understand why he had made that choice. But they supported him anyway. And so, the former-mariner along with his parents and his brother began farming in their land.

This perils of chemical-doused food dawned upon Pathak in 2011.

“I began to look at the food on my plate differently. The chapati made from wheat we grew had no taste. When kept unconsumed for a day, it would change its colour. The basmati rice we grew had no flavour, nutrition or aroma. The quality of the food kept degrading, and I couldn’t bring myself to sit back. The answer was simple: If we poisoned our land, the crops it gave us would also be poisonous. It was at the time, I decided to do away with all the chemicals.”

The shift wasn’t easy. But he was determined.

The initial years were full of trial-and-error because the family did not have the right guidance and mentorship to make the shift to organic farming.

“I realised that the land that was suddenly deprived of chemicals started showing side-effects, very similar to an addict who quit drugs or alcohol and suffered with withdrawal. In the following year, we got in touch with Kheti Virasat Mission. Their workshops seemed instrumental in helping me adopt methods that worked for me in the long run.”

He attended workshops of a few leading proponents for organic-farming such as Odisha’s seed saviour Debal Deb, veteran farmer Deepak Sachdeva, and many others to nail down techniques that would suit the requirements of his field, the soil condition, and the climate.

Today, in his organic farm that spans eight acres, the merchant navy officer turned organic farmer grows grains, lentils, pulses, spices, seasonal vegetables and an array of fruits.

Some of the grains he grows include wheat, sorghum, maize, barley, and paddy. Veggies and leafy greens include mentha, onion, bottle gourd, brinjal, okra, bitter gourd, moringa, etc.

Spices and oilseeds include mustard, sesame seeds, taramira (arugula), curry leaf, garlic, turmeric, etc.

Lentils include lean yellow lentils, black gram, horse gram, etc. He also grows stevia, lemongrass, vetiver grass, etc. and fruits such as plums, mangoes, pomegranate, papaya, guava, banana, lemon, etc.

Pankaj has dedicated a patch to forest plantation where he has planted trees like babul, sacred fig, banyan trees. He intends to turn one patch into a fruit orchard over time in a phased manner. Currently, he has planted about 350 fruit trees, and aims to scale this number to 800.

Pathak’s fight is not just against chemicals but also the ill-effects of illegal mining that has depleted the groundwater resources in the area.

He recently stopped growing paddy and sugarcane due to its water-intensive nature. Pathak thinks the fruit orchard will not only help improve groundwater table but since it is less-water intensive, he thinks it could be a good business move too.

He highlights some of the techniques saying, “I do not use inputs from outside my field, apart from National Centre of Organic Farming’s waste decomposer. All the biomass on my field is used to make bio-fertilisers. This includes making vermicompost using indigenous worms, biofertilisers such as jeevamrut, beejamrut, amritjal and also using the slurry from his biogas plant to nourish the soil.

This biogas plant powers his farm and kitchen too.

Pesticides are prepared using either the hot or cold techniques. In the hot technique, the leaves of bitter herbs like neem are boiled in 20 litres of water until the liquid reduces to half the quantity. Once done, this extract is filtered and then sprayed on plants.

In the cold technique, these leaves are churned into a chutney-like paste when added to a 200-litre drum of water, with one bottle of waste decomposer and two kg of jaggery. It takes 15 days to prepare the pesticide. The mixture has to be turned every alternate day. Once filtered, this solution can be sprayed twice a week on the crops. This has helped reduce pest attacks to a bare minimum in Pathak’s field as well as the kitchen garden.

The farmer preserves, multiplies and grows native varieties and exchanges seeds with other farmers too. He sourced many varieties of seeds from Kheti Virasat Mission and the World Organic Congress that took place two years ago.

He highlights the features of some of these native varieties saying, “One of the native varieties that I grow includes Navratan wheat which is sold popularly under a ‘sugar-free’ tag. When sold to a dealer in Bengaluru, it earned me Rs 7,000 per quintal, which is Rs 70 per kg higher than regular varieties. Similarly, the variety of Bansi earns Rs 60 per kg. Another variety of basmati rice grows up to six-feet-high and boasts of high nutrition and aroma.”

While a hybrid crop can take as little as 90 days to grow, these native varieties are in sync with the local climate. They flower when they get adequate eight hours of sun. In case of a storm or any other climatic adversity, hybrid varieties undergo stress while native varieties can withstand them.

“In this age of global warming and climate change, these native varieties are our only hope.”

The organic farming advocate has also built a tank with 10,000-litre storage capacity that sources water from a well on the farm. Different soil-enriching mixtures such as jeevamrut are prepared in this tank and later added to the soil through irrigation.

“Today, my input cost has been reduced to almost zero. Excluding the labour costs, I earn profits of four to five lakhs a year. The only costs that I incur are the fuel costs.”

Another source of additional income is bio enzymes. Apart from extracting juice from lemons, he utilises the peels to make natural floor and bathroom cleaners. Last year, it fetched him an additional income of Rs 50,000. He also has an order for herbal products worth Rs two to three lakhs.

Also Read: Himachal Doctor Spends Rs 10 Lakh From His Own Pocket to Treat Poor Women For Free!

Most of his produce is sold in raw form to Rajeev Kohli from KVM which in turn gets sold at the Kudrati Kisaan Haat at Gurdaspur. Kohli’s haat runs on a no-profit, no-loss margin, so the producer farmer gets good rates.

In the spare time when he awaits the harvest season, Pathak runs a common service centre that provides government e-services.

In a final message, he says, “Organic farming is a slow process. You may incur losses in the first three to four years, but once your soil has become chemical-free, the benefits are long term. It is our only way of saving our future generations.”

If this story inspired you, get in touch with Pankaj on 9625328499 or write to him on Pathakpankaj1982@gmail.com,

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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Gummalla Venkata Krishna Bapineedu recalls the day when he escaped the jaws of death in the nick of time.

“11 years ago, when I was working in the field, a snake bit me. For more than an hour, the bite was undetected, till I collapsed on the field and couldn’t raise my arm. I soon started frothing and was rushed to a hospital in the nearest taluk, and later shifted to Hyderabad for treatment.”

Click here to begin your journey into the world of organic food.

Doctors called him lucky. Family and friends heaved a sigh of relief and things seemed fine. But Bapineedu felt distressed, as if something was not right. The problem was, fate was not done with him. The following year, he again stared at the face of death during a harrowing accident. Ironically, he was on his way to the hospital for treatment.

“While travelling on my two-wheeler to board a bus to the city-based hospital for treatment, a speeding vehicle rammed into me. The accident was severe enough to make hospital calls frequent over the next few years,” he shares with a rueful twist to his mouth.

As the saying goes, when the going gets tough . . . . the tough listen to the two close-calls with death and change. For the better. And that is precisely what happened to Bapineedu.

“I could not farm for almost three years due to the accident. I had to give the farm on lease. When I recovered, I decided I had to go organic. It might seem out of the blue and completely unrelated, but farming is my profession. And I am putting food on people’s plates. I had to make my profession meaningful and grow poison-free, chemical-free food.”

Bapineedu’s change of heart sprung from his need to grow visha-mukta aahar (chemical-free) for his children and other people. And he did not back down from the change and the challenges that come with it.

He began his journey of natural farming by attending workshops and following the zero-budgeting canons of the famous agriculturist, Subhash Palekar.

Bapineedu has a 30-acre farm where he now grows organic produce, but how the farmland came to him is another interesting story.

He was only five years old when his father decided to leave everything behind after selling their three-acre farm. The family moved from their native village Rangampeta in East Godavari District of Andhra Pradesh and migrated 750 km away to Budihal Camp in Sindhanur, Raichur district in Karnataka.

All the money that his father had was spent on buying a 30-acre land near this remote village they called home. It was aloof and cut off from the rest of the world without electricity, water connection or schools in the vicinity.

It was extremely remote and amidst a dense jungle. The main road was a five kilometers walk away and we would wade through 1.5 feet deep waters in the monsoons to get to it.

When his father realised the move to Karnataka had deprived his children of primary education he attempted to fill the gap by bringing a private tutor to the village in 1973. He paid Rs.500 per month to him to teach his four kids. He even built a home for the teacher and provided him with the required amenities.

The teacher soon got bored living the village life and left. Later, almost all the siblings became engaged with farming activities except for the youngest brother Sridhar, who got a chance at formal education.

And so, for as long as he can remember, Bapineedu has been working as a farmer. It’s been a journey of four decades. The family managed to buy a tractor 1986 to develop the entire 30-acres.

For the longest time, like many other farmers around me, I was a proponent of chemical farming. Back in 1977, we would add two bags of chemical fertilisers to grow paddy on one acre, by 2000, this number rose to eight bags. For many farmers, this number went up to 14 bags per acre by 2018.”

However, now nothing can deviate Bapineedu from practicing organic farming. Used to getting decent earnings through the high yields of chemical farming, he still has to adjust with the losses one faces in the initial years of making the change over. But the farmer hasn’t given up.

“Yes the yield is not as high, but at least it is keeping people healthy and isn’t poisoned.”

In the 30-acre organic farm, he grows paddy on 15 acres, sugarcane on 14 acres, and the rest one acre is dedicated to pulses.

His latest venture that he kick-started only a year ago was producing organic jaggery. With his efforts over the last one year, one acre of his plot helps him yield 40 quintals of sugarcane which is later processed in the small factory he set up on his field at the cost of Rs 10 lakh.

While he has managed to sell off 50 quintals of jaggery, his mission is to sell 500 quintals stored in his godown too.

He is currently waiting to get the certificate which he hope will improve his sale. Though the progress is slow, he hopes once the certification process is complete, he would receive better rates that would increase the income of his farm to Rs one lakh per acre per year.

When asked about the methods he uses to maintain his farm, he informs that he has dug two acres to build a rainwater harvesting bund tank for water supply. Similarly, for enriching the soil, he prepares jeevamrutham (bio-fertiliser) which is administered to the crops through drip irrigation.

Pest attacks are avoided or controlled by spraying concoctions made from garlic, chillies, neem leaves, buttermilk, etc. which are filtered and sprayed onto the crops.

We are farmers, we are the providers of food. It is not just a need but our responsibility to grow poison-free food. Today chemicals are not only ruining our farms, but also the balance of nature. We are threatening the health and future of our children and the generations to follow. We are contaminating our water resources. By doing away with chemicals, we promise our future generations a healthy life and a better environment. It is never too late to change. I can only plead my farmer brothers and sisters to make this switch.

The man has received a few awards for his work in natural farming including one from his role model, Subhash Palekar and also from the local organic farming association.

“I am not highly educated, but when I was first called on stage by Palekar Sahab to say a few words, I requested every farmer in the crowd, ‘if not your entire field, start with one acre. But start somewhere. Organic farming is the only way to go and save our future generations’.”

Also Read: Mom’s Cancer Makes Farmer Go Organic; Grows Chemical-Free Food & Saves 60% Water

The man is a proud father of two daughters. One of whom maintains his accounts and another who is an IIT & ISB alumnus.

Sowjanya, who supported her father set up the factory says, “He is the most progressive man I have known so far. ”

His youngest brother, Sridhar who was instrumental in helping me get in touch with Bapineedu, says, “The fact that he is my eldest brother is not the reason I get inspired by him. His terrific willpower to pursue what he wants with full of passion, dedication and commitment makes me look up to him in awe.”

If this story inspired you, get in touch with Bapineedu at 8762296048 or 9481946908

You can also get in touch with him at gvkbnaturalfarming@gmail.com

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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Muniraj, 34, a farmer based in Hosur in Tamil Nadu, belongs to a family that has been farming for generations.

Like farmers from across the country, Muniraj would spend exorbitant amounts of money on transporting his fresh produce to the market. He would also spend money on hiring people who were responsible for transportation as he had to stay in the farm to overlook the activities.

There were times when, despite shelling out so much money on transportation, he would have to sell his produce to the middlemen at low prices and thereby incur losses.

Want to eat chemical-free food and go all organic? Click here to check a whole bunch of organic food!

But, things have changed for Muniraj now.

Four years ago, he came across WayCool foods on the internet. Today, he saves on transportation costs as WayCool procures the produce directly from his doorstep. He also feels more secure now that he doesn’t have to bear the brunt of market fluctuations.

Muniraj has scaled up his farming operations from just growing mint to other vegetables like different varieties of tomato, beetroot, and cauliflower among others, in his 15-acre farm. His income from farming for a period of three to four months has also increased from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 7.2 lakh.

Chennai-based WayCool foods is a social enterprise launched by Sanjay Dasari and Karthik Jayaraman in 2015, which aims towards modifying the supply chain for agricultural products. WayCool closely works with almost 35,000 farmers like Muniraj and procures fresh produce from 51 regions in 10 states. In fact, it moves almost 250 tonnes of products every day!

This way, it not only benefits the farmers by removing the middlemen but also reduces wastage as agricultural products have a very short shelf life.

The co-founders zeroed in on India’s paradox of being the world’s second-largest producer of fresh produce while still allowing up to 40 per cent food wastage.

“We realised the importance of building a farm-to-fork company that can ethically source food products and deliver hygienic food to end consumers. We spotted an opportunity to organise a fragmented supply chain using capabilities that the automotive industry had mastered – thus improving both efficiency and responsiveness of the supply chain with the use of technology,” inform the co-founders.

An IIT-Madras alumnus, Karthik Jayaraman, WayCool’s CEO, has a diverse experience of over two decades in the fields of engineering, automotive and management consulting.

Sanjay Dasari, at 25 years of age, holds a Graduate degree from Babson College of Entrepreneurship in USA with specialisation in Finance and Strategic Management.

He has been awarded the 35 under 35 by Entrepreneur India (Feb 2019) and is a part of the coveted 30 under 30 Asia 2019 by Forbes Asia.

Dasari says that food wastage is generally calculated from the time when a farmer harvests their stock, to the time when it is sold to the end consumer or goes to waste. There are a few things that affect this number, across product handling practices and demand-supply gaps. He states an example to explain this.

“If a farmer harvests one ton of tomatoes, but there is only demand for 750 kg, the balance 250 kg will go to waste if he cannot connect it to an alternative market. However, even if there is a demand for 1 ton, but that 1 ton is transported inefficiently/unhygienically (open vehicles, using sacks instead of crates, over-stuffing of crates, etc) there can be a minimum of 5 per cent wastage at each step,” he said.

WayCool is operating an end-to-end digitally-tracked and continually-monitored supply chain. The enterprise not only uses Machine Learning Algorithms to forecast customer requirements but has also invested in physical automation using conveyor belts, weigh in motion machines, etc, that minimise product handling and damage in transit.

This results in a supply chain that is not only faster but far more cost-efficient compared to the traditional industry.

“Taking the entire supply chain into consideration, the industry operates at around a 25-40 per cent food wastage metric, given the number of intermediaries who are involved and the way by which products are handled and transported today. At WayCool, the wastage figure is roughly 2-5 per cent, depending on the stock keeping unit (SKU),” adds Dasari.

WayCool bridging a gap

So, how does WayCool reach out to the farmers like Muniraj at the grassroots level? Dasari explains that the most common way is through FPOs (Farmer Producer Organisations). FPOs are created when there are 1,000+ farmers in a certain region that want to get organised so that they can plan stock, negotiate prices, and share information easily.

The start-up has MOUs signed with the National Agro Foundation, MS Swaminathan Foundation, Government of Andhra, and the Government of Maharashtra, specifically focused on the creation and sustenance of FPOs in various regions.

Outside of the FPO model, WayCool runs rural collections centers that are operated by local farmer entrepreneurs. “Lately, we have launched a farmer advisory program called Outgrow, that works with farmers right from seed selection, to market forecasts, to liquidation plans. Through this, we can customise specific solutions to each individual farmer’s unique situation,” says Dasari.

WayCool also provides farmers with advice on better crop planning, improved produce quality & productivity, lower cultivation costs, assured returns, and fair pricing.

“Before being associated with WayCool, I would spend anywhere between Rs. 900 to 1,800 in transporting the agricultural produce to the nearest mandis (market place). I would also have to hire extra manpower for this process as I was unable to sell my products in the market everyday because of high costs,” explains Muniraj.

Now, Muniraj saves on transportation costs as WayCool procures the agricultural produce directly from the farmer’s doorstep. WayCool moves almost 150 tonnes of products every day. Muniraj also feels more secure now that he doesn’t have to bear the brunt of market fluctuations. “I get a fair price for my produce now which is set by WayCool foods and I do not have to sell my produce at a much lower price out of desperation. There were times when I had to do that,” he said.

Customers who have been associated with WayCool Foods, frequently buying fruits and vegetables, depend on their services for the freshness.

Vijay Noel, 42, Material Manager at Taj Madras Flight Kitchen said that they have been ordering their daily groceries from WayCool since the past two years. “The quality of fruits and vegetables that we buy from WayCool is superb. It feels like we have directly brought them from the farm,” he said. He added that the products are also uniform and graded by the field officers who are responsible for collecting these items from the farms, ensuring good quality of the products.

Everyday challenges and technological intervention for better results

As any other functioning enterprise, WayCool too has its own set of teething problems that this industry brings, given the relative lack of control on supplies. Dasari explains that factors like unseasonal rains have caused serious price fluctuations in fruits and vegetables.

To counter this, WayCool has tried to maintain consistent sourcing from its farmers at fair prices, while ensuring the customers on the front end get substitute products in the form of pastes and purees, etc.

“The goal is to bring consistency to farmers and customers both while ensuring that the company’s social impact goals are still being met. To drive this, many poka-yokes are put in place to ensure that errors are minimised, and there are enough cross-checks across the supply chain,” says Dasari.

On the other hand, the primary challenges that they faced initially include an insufficient scale to engage meaningfully with farmers, the unpredictability of demand and friction in operations that prevented scaling. While the first two challenges were addressed gradually as they started scaling up their operations, the third required significant investments.

Technology is a big aspect which has made Waycool’s operations smoother, building a transparent and efficient supply chain. On the supply side, there is a heavy reliance on forecasting tools and crop planning software that has been built. Each individual crate is barcoded and traceable back to the source, product handling in Distribution Centre is automated. This automation has helped WayCool become far more efficient both in terms of speed of product handling, and in terms of cost incurred.

While information technology plays a large role in scalability, Dasari said that this industry requires physical operations automation as well – products are heavy and unwieldy, and the sheer physical work involved in moving produce around makes it non-scalable beyond a certain level – both due to the effort and errors.

“We look at farmers more as entrepreneurs and business owners when we engage with them,” signs off Dasari.

Pictures Courtesy: WayCool Foods

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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“Our former president, APJ Abdul Kalam, said, [A] dream is not the thing you see in sleep but is that thing that doesn’t let you sleep. I, too had a dream of making my farm fertile, and it kept me up on most nights,” says Gansu Mahto, a farmer from Sadma village of Jharkhand.

Gansu’s father owned a 9-acre plot of land, but its produce was hardly enough to sustain the family for six months. The eldest among three brothers, Gansu decided to halt his education after passing out of Class 12, and work as a labourer to earn extra money.

A chemical-free fertiliser that is made from recycled  flowers, which improves soil texture, and makes plants more robust and greener? Yes it exists! Check it out, here.

In 1991 when he was just 18, the man was working as a daily wage construction worker at Ranchi, where he would earn Rs 50 per day. He would travel 50 km on a bicycle every day from Sadma to Ranchi and back.

“Daily wage workers are treated like slaves. No one considers them as humans. Once, after completing some backbreaking tasks, I took a little break to relax, and my supervisor lost his temper. That’s when I thought that even though there were hardships in farming, it is something of your own. You are not a slave to anyone,” he says.

After working for three years as a labourer, Gansu returned to his barren land and started toiling day and night to make it fertile. Initially, he began by growing ‘Goda Dhan,’ a type of paddy that can be grown on barren land.

The turning point

In 1998, Gansu tried planting some capsicum in just 0.15 acres of his farm, which was a huge success and he earned Rs 1.2 lakh from it that year. This gave him a ray of hope, and he kept experimenting with different crops at his farm. He would also visit progressive farmers to learn from them.

In 2015 while visiting one such farmer, he met a Krishi Mitra—a government officer employed to help farmers—at his village, who suggested that he join them for a 5-day training programme at Chhattisgarh.

“The programme was being organised by successful farmers to help marginal farmers like us. We had to pay Rs 5,000 for the travel and the stay, and it was a big amount in those days. But I wanted to take this chance. In hindsight, had I not spent Rs 5,000 then, I wouldn’t have reached 50 lakhs today,” says Gansu.

Gansu attended the programme and ended up learning several tricks to start organic farming. He also learnt about how agriculture can become profitable only if the investment cost is almost zero. His biggest illusion that a barren land could never become fertile was also erased through this training.

“There were people who did not have any land of their own and were farming on leased land and earning profits. I thought if these people could do it, why not me?” he says.

1. First steps

photo source

Gansu returned with a dream of making his farm fertile enough, to feed his family for not just six months, but the entire year. He strived day and night for 15 days and provided all possible nourishment to the soil of his farm.

“I gathered all the dung from the cattle on the farm, made organic fertiliser and fed my land with the same. After 15 days, when the soil looked ready, I started planting watermelons,” informed Gansu.

2. Kisan Credit Card

PHOTO SOURCE 

Gansu made use of his Kisan credit card to get a loan of 1.20 lakh. He used the money to install drip irrigation, mulching, and a greenhouse and poly house on his farm.

The Kisan Credit Card scheme is a credit scheme introduced in August 1998 by Indian banks. This model scheme was prepared by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development to provide term loans and agricultural needs.

Its objective is to meet the general credit requirements of the agriculture sector by giving financial support to farmers. The premium is borne by both the bank and borrower in a 2:1 ratio. The validity period is five years, with an option to extend for up to three more years.

The Kisan Credit Card (KCC) offers credit to the farmers in two types—cash credit and term credit—for allied activities such as pump sets, land development, plantation, and drip irrigation. Click here to apply for one.

3.Drip Irrigation and Mulching

PHOTO SOURCE

Gansu used the loan to install a drip irrigation system and mulching on the farm. For this, he applied for Prime Minister Krishi Sinchayee Yojana. Under this scheme, farmers can get a subsidy of 90% to install a drip irrigation system on their farm, so, Gansu ended paying only Rs 6000 per acre for this purpose.

Click here to apply for a subsidy for drip irrigation and to know more about this scheme. You can also download the mobile app for PMKSY here.

Gansu also uses the mulching technique, which protects the saplings from excessive heat or cold and limits the growth of weeds too.

4. Green House and Poly House

Gansu has set up poly house in 4000 square meters of his farm. Farmers can get a subsidy of 90% for this purpose as well.

“Poly houses helps us grow unseasonal and exotic vegetables, which have a huge demand in the market. The climate inside can be controlled, and hence lesser pest attacks are seen here. Thus one hardly needs to apply pesticides or chemical fertilisers. The quality and taste of the crop cultivated inside the poly house is also better,” explains Gansu.

Click here to apply for a poly house.

Turnover of Rs 50 lakh

The watermelons were ready to be harvested in 75 days, and all the above techniques gave him an excellent quantity and quality of the harvest. Consequently, Gansu made a profit of Rs 2 lakh after selling them for a reasonable rate in the market.

After watermelons, Gansu planted capsicums at the same plot and earned Rs. 4.5 lakh. Once Gansu was successful with vegetables and fruits, he thought of trying flowers and in 2016, he planted gerberas in his poly house. This year Gansu sold the flowers and earned Rs 35 lakh.

In 2018 Gansu planted capsicum in 2 acres, brinjals in 2 acres, tomatoes in 1.5 acres, cucumbers in 1 acre, cabbage in 0.50 acre land and paddy in the rest. Along with this, he planted gerberas.

His turnover from this was Rs. 50 lakh and the total profit earned was Rs 20 lakh.

Showing other farmers the path of success

Today, Gansu is a successful farmer, but he has struggled hard. Now, he wants other farmers to follow the same path, without encountering the roadblocks that he did.

“I did not have any aim in life before this. I would work to ensure there was food on the table. But now my life has an aim. I was lucky that I could meet the right people at the right time and change my life. Now I want to change the lives of every farmer in my country. And I will do anything possible to ensure this,” he says.

So far, Gansu has given free organic farming training to almost 15,000 farmers. He also shares his knowledge with the agriculture students who visit him often. Many youngsters who had left their farms and village to work in the cities have come back to their roots after Gansu’s training.

Gansu’s eldest daughter, who has a BEd degree helps him out on the farm. His son who is preparing for his medical entrance exams, also helps out whenever possible.

“I wake up at 5 AM every day and work on my farm till 8. After that, I leave to visit the farmers who need me. Meanwhile, my eldest daughter takes care of the entire farm. My family supports me fully in helping other farmers,” says Gansu.

Why are organic products expensive, and what can we do about it?

Gansu explains that at present, there is a high demand for organic produce in the market, but the supply is low. Hence, whatever organic produce is available in the market, is very expensive. But this issue can be resolved if we have enough supply to meet the demand.

Thus to change this situation, Gansu has pledged to divert at least 20, 000 farmers in his area towards organic farming.

“It is a myth among farmers that organic farming gives lesser produce and hence, lesser profit. On the contrary, when you go organic, you save the money you otherwise spent on chemical fertilisers and pesticides, thus gaining better profit. Organic produce is healthier and tastier. If every farmer grows organic produce, the prices will automatically come down,” says Gansu.

Gansu appeals to every farmer in distress to not lose hope and contact him if they need any help. You can call Gansu on 9065224475 or visit his place at – Gansu Mahto, Village –Sadma, Block–Oramanjhi, Ranchi, Jharkhand.

Also Read: 97-Year-Old Pioneering Farmer Goes From TBI Hero To Padma Shri Winner!

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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TH Prabhakar, 45, a farmer from Dacharam village in the Siddipet district in Telangana—where atleast 435 Mandals out of the total 584 are drought-hit—was facing a hard time due to the scarcity of water in the region.

However, five months ago, Prabhakar heard his friend and fellow farmer, Kana Reddy, speak about Kheyti and the services provided by the startup. Intrigued, he started availing Kheyti’s services and claims that he has earned good profits with comparatively lesser inputs.

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Kheyti offers technology solutions for small farmers to increase their yields. They have also developed ‘Greenhouse-in-a-box,’ an affordable, modular greenhouse comprising of services that reduces water usage by 90%, and helps farmers grow seven times more food.

This not only helps farmers earn a stable income, but they are also able to earn greater profits, which is what precisely what has happened with Prabhakar.

Kheyti was founded in late 2015 by Sathya Raghu Mokkapati, Kaushik K, Saumya, and Ayush Sharma. Sathya spent six years in giving training and providing marketing linkages to smallholder farmers in Telangana and Karnataka along with Ayush through their other organisation, Cosmos Green.

Their experience at Cosmos Green is what gave them the confidence to found Kheyti.

Meanwhile, Kaushik spent five years in B-Able, a social enterprise that helps schools dropouts to get mainstream jobs and placement services, while Saumya was a co-founder of YelloLeaf, a social enterprise assisting blue-collar workers from India.

In 2014, Sathya and Kaushik met each other in the Acumen India Fellowship Program, and that is where the conversation about Kheyti first began. As four of them were already in the social sector, they acknowledged that hard work doesn’t pay smallholder farmers in India. Thus, Kheyti started with the vision to increase the profits of small and marginal farmers.

Why Kheyti’s greenhouse model works

Sathya explains that farming is susceptible to conditions like excessive heat or rain, drought, pest attacks etc. The other significant gap concerns helpful advisory about seeds and fertilizers.

“We build houses to live in safety and to protect ourselves from environmental factors like heat, rain, insects etc. Likewise, a greenhouse helps plants to thrive. Our greenhouse cuts off excess heat by 2-4 degrees Celsius, reduces pests by 90% and saves 98% water compared to open field conventional irrigation,” says Sathya.

So, once they realised the crux of the problem and developed a sustainable solution to it, how did they actually go about implementing it?

“We reached out to farmers through Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) and conducted meetings in the villages. We explained our model to these new farmers and then we took them to the fields to see farmers in our network working and got them to interact,” explains Sathya.

The ‘Greenhouse-in-a-box’ kit has two variants—one costs about Rs 2 lakh (for 320 sq mts) while the other costs about Rs 3.35 lakh (for 462 sq mts).

“Our farmers get a loan from Bank of Baroda to buy the greenhouse and Kheyti does the installation,” says Sathya. In addition to this, the farmers also get training on what to grow, how to grow, when to grow and some practices etc.

Educating and Empowering farmers

Prabhakar said that after having been associated with Kheyti, he has learnt how much fertiliser and pesticide must be sprayed on the crop. Earlier when he would buy pesticides, he would spray it in large quantities thinking this would result in higher yields.

Kheyti tries to ensure that the farmers associated with them use as little chemicals as possible. Only about 3 ml to 10 ml of pesticide is used, and it is diluted with at least 20 litres of water.

“Once the farmer has bought the greenhouse from us, we remain closely associated with them for at least five years,” says Sathya.

Kheyti ensures that the farmers get agronomy services at their doorstep, the right input at the right time, and guarantees that their products will be purchased.

“The farmer gets the highest market price for their produce and once procured, the produce is sold to retailers like Big Basket, More among others,” adds Sathya.

Prabhakar informs that the procurement of the produce by Kheyti has helped him save money on transportation costs he would’ve incurred in selling his produce at the market places.

Usually, he would end up spending a minimum of Rs 500 in hiring an auto to transport his produce and labour costs would be extra. Now, all he does is gather the produce and reach a common point in the village clusters that Kheyti operates.

Although right now, Kheyti tries to disseminate most of the agriculture-related information in person, they plan on doing this remotely in the future as they will gradually scale up their operations.

Explaining that they have started doing that already, Sathya says, “We create local WhatsApp groups where farmers send photos daily, and our team advises them by looking into photos. If it’s an emergency, then we go to the fields. We are using software for Customer Relationship Management (CRM), where most of our updates, analytics, reports automatically and dynamically. We use communication software for Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and calls for mass communications and updates.”

Currently, they have 154 farmers out of which 113 greenhouses installed and for the remaining farmers, the installation process is ongoing.

Right now, Kheyti only operates in Telangana, but Sathya mentions that they soon plan to scale up their operations in states like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.

“We plan to reach 3,000 farmers by the end of next year, and about 10,000 farmers, by the end of 2021,” he concludes.

Also Read: Odisha Man’s Start-Up Makes Sure There Are No Chemicals, Toxins in Your Veggies!

Pictures Courtesy: Kheyti

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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As a kid, Rahul Sharma’s summer vacations were spent in Mustafabad, a tiny village in Kapurthala district, about three hours away from Chandigarh.

Speaking to The Better India (TBI), Rahul says, “We basked in the love our grandparents showered on us in Mustafabad. My grandfather was the sarpanch of the village. After graduating from Lahore Agricultural University, he managed to procure land to build our farm. The same land has been with my family for the last 100 years.”

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Though Rahul’s father, Banwari Lal Sharma, grew up helping his family on their farm, he moved to the city when he got appointed as a Professor of Physics at the National Institute of Technology Kurukshetra.

Thus, Rahul grew up in the city, used to the ease of city life.

Little did the young Rahul know that when he would grow older, his need to reconnect with his roots would see him quit a cushy 18-year-old IT career and go back to the same village and grow organic food in his ancestral farmland.

Shedding light on how the switch of careers happened, Rahul talks of his interest in learning different skills. This was perhaps one of the reasons why he opted to pursue a diploma in computers in the early 90s despite being an Economics and Statistics graduate.

When he travelled to Indonesia on vacation, his friend told him about an IT job there. Not only Rahul bagged the position, but he also made Jakarta home for almost 12 years, learning the ropes of the job and climbing the corporate ladder.

In 2006, when the IT boom hit India, he quit his job in Indonesia to work for more than eight years in Wipro in Bengaluru.

“During the last four years of my career in the field of IT, I felt saturated. I kept asking myself what my next move would be. The money was flowing in, but there were times I would have to travel 18 hours to the US for three-hour presentations and carry my laptop even on family vacations. My health was deteriorating. Money was no longer giving me satisfaction. I wanted to do something meaningful.”

This was the time the techie also started reading about food and health, which opened up new avenues for him.

And now from growing a tomato plant in the balcony of his rented home in Bengaluru to becoming a full-fledged natural farmer, Rahul has come a long way.

The switch from IT to farming was difficult, considering his wife and 5-year-old son had to move out of their rented home in Bengaluru and into his parents’ home in Chandigarh.

“My wife had lived her entire life in Chennai. So the move to the north was a culture shock to her. We were financially secure in Bengaluru, and the uncertainty of not having a fixed salary per month was scary too. But she told me, ‘If I stop you from pursuing what you want to do now, I know you will agree, but you won’t be happy.’ And so for my sake, she agreed.”

In 2016, he quit his job and moved to Chandigarh. Within five days of his move, he had travelled to Mustafabad and began his work. The land, which had been given on lease to someone, was choked with chemicals.

So the first plan of action was to revive the soil in the four-acre patch.

Today he grow crops such as wheat, black rice, basmati rice, moong, masur and arhar daal, desi makka (Maize), chana (black gram), turmeric, sesame (for oil), mustard (for oil), cotton (rainfed) etc.

“When I started, nothing was organic. The amount of urea consumed by each plant was so high that the soil was dead. It had no microorganisms, earthworms or natural minerals. I did not rely on any rocket science to revive it; instead, I went back to the traditional techniques that our ancestors followed and had been forgotten by our farmers in their greed for greater yield.”

Some of these methods include

1. Crop rotation & nitrogen-fixing crops

Crop rotation is the practice of growing a series of different types of crops in the same area in sequenced seasons to help reduce soil erosion, increase soil fertility and crop yield. An excellent alternative to monocropping, it mitigates the buildup of pathogens and pests that often occurs when one species is continuously cropped, and can also improve soil structure and fertility by increasing biomass from varied root structures.

He developed his own sowing pattern. He started with lentils whose roots are nitrogen-fixing in nature. Once the crop was close to harvest, he tilled the crop residue back into the soil as green manuring. This helped improve the fertility of the soil, especially for crops like basmati rice, wheat or maize in the subsequent season.

2. System of Rice Intensification vs Flood irrigation

He wanted to prove that rice can be grown without depleting groundwater resources extensively by flooding fields.

“It is a myth that rice is water-intensive. One of the reasons why flood irrigation is used is to prevent weeds from growing because weeding is an additional input cost to the farmer. So I decided to use the system of Rice Intensification.”

It is a methodology aimed at increasing the yield of rice. It is a low-water, labour-intensive method that uses seedlings that are single-spaced and typically hand-weeded with special tools.

3. Green manuring:

He doesn’t own any cattle, so he has no access to cow dung. Yet his soil is fertile thanks to his green manuring technique. Rahul ensures when he is growing a particular crop, some part of his land is left to rest to which he adds green manure. Once the harvest season is over, the harvested patches are laid to rest with green manuring, and the previously manured patches are used for growing next season. This form of mulching helps the soil retain its moisture and significant nutrients.

Every season he has one major crop and two or more supplementary crops.

In the first year itself, he grew close to nine different varieties of crops successfully. “I experiment a lot on my field. Recently, I even successfully grew a Manipuri variety of black rice.”

Fortunately, he has not witnessed any major form of pest infestation. He grows his crops with the idea that pests will consume 5 to 10 per cent of them since they are part of the system and must not be killed.

4. Biodiverse wild patch

To promote biodiversity on his farm, he has created a wild patch where he practices no-tillage farming. This one-fourth of an acre patch has different fruit trees and shrubs that attract birds and insects such as spiders, grasshoppers, ladybugs, etc.

“I plan to create patches like these around the farm. Though my journey has only started, I aim to build my food forest.”

Apart from being a full-time organic farmer, he works with the NGO, Kheti Virasat Mission and the Chandigarh Organic Farmers Market. He also promotes urban farming and conducts workshops in schools and colleges. He also provides advisory services to agriculture startups.

Rahul has created his network of customers. Speaking to TBI, Dr Sanjay Puri, who has been sourcing produce from Rahul’s farm for the last six months, says, “I have personally visited Rahul’s farm. The produce might be expensive, but the taste and freshness of it make it worth it. It tastes just like food would when we were growing up when food was chemical-free. I am hoping to buy many more products from him.”

Gurvinder Kaur, who runs the skill-development cell at MCM DAV college, says, “I came across mind-numbing articles that spoke about how chemicals enter our food chain. And so, as part of the Skill development programme I was heading in college, I put forth the suggestion of teaching our girls sustainable agriculture, which is perhaps the oldest known skill. Our principal was forthcoming. Since the last two years, Rahul has played a vital role in working with our students to build a vegetable patch. We grow seasonal veggies. We also consume some of the products on his farm like wheat and turmeric.”

Also Read: This Punjab Lawyer Traded a Rs 1.5 Lakh/Month Package to Create a Lush Eco-Farm

As his farm is just three hours away, Rahul visits it every ten days. He is now trying to get his son to inculcate a love for growing food through their kitchen garden in Chandigarh. “In a 30x4m long strip, we grow seasonal vegetables and greens like tulsi, amaranth, bitter gourd, cucumber, bottle gourd, ladyfinger, etc. I want my son to have a connection with the soil, just like my father did.”

In a final message, he says, “We all have our favourite tailors, stylists, and designers. Yet, none of us have our favourite farmers! Though my kitchen isn’t 100 per cent independent of the market, I connect with organic farmers to source the ingredients I cannot grow. So I plead people to support organic farmers.”

To those who are keen on growing their food, he says, “If you have your piece of land, what are you waiting for? For those who are hesitant to make the switch, start somewhere. Even if it is, with one pot and one tomato seed in your balcony, like I did, revolutions are not sparked overnight; they begin with small steps.”

If this story inspired you, get in touch with Rahul on honest.farmer.mail@gmail.com

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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Walking around in a lush green field, dressed in sweatpants, a T-shirt and sneakers, Abhishek Dhamma from Delhi’s Palla village, hardly fits the typical image of a farmer.

“People assume that lack of jobs or pressure from my family forced me into farming,” Abhishek tells The Better India. “My own family stared in disbelief when I told them about my decision.”

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This is because until he completed his degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering in 2014, Abhishek detested the idea of joining his family’s farming business. For him, working in the fields meant hours of strenuous activity and inevitable loss, which, to an extent, was his family’s reality.

Abhishek had made his stance on agriculture clear to his family from the very beginning and was never pressured to take forward his father’s business. He had full control over his professional life, and his future plans were set.

So, what made the young man drop his strong beliefs, and become an urban kisan?

It all started in 2014 after his graduation.

“I am a fitness freak and have played cricket and volleyball all my life. Before I started looking for jobs, I took a break and starting gymming. That’s when I learnt about the significance of nutrition and the importance of a proper diet for a healthy body.”

Abhishek’s curiosity for developing a healthy diet culminated in in-depth research.

“Of course I knew about using pesticides to grow plants, but it was only after some research I got to know about the terrible health implications of doing so,” he adds.

Even though Abhishek was aware, he did not attempt to change the non-organic farming process in his family’s 25-acre field due to lack of expertise and experience.

He weighed his options and started a tiny vegetable garden around a temple on the banks of the river Yamuna. His grandfather had built this temple, and the land around it was highly fertile but uncultivated.

I looked at several YouTube videos and began growing traditional veggies like tomatoes, bitter gourd, bottle gourd, reddish and some exotic ones like broccoli and red lettuce. The six-foot boundary wall kept the pests and insects away. I used a small amount of organic fertiliser and crop residues to provide nutrition to the veggies.

A year later, Abhishek saw a drastic change in terms of the colour, taste and quality of the veggies when he compared them with the ones available in the market.

The success gave him the confidence to experiment in the 25-acre property. “Unknowingly, the tiny garden became my first step towards becoming an ‘agripreneur’ (agriculture+entrepreneur).”

Being a health-conscious person, Abhishek cultivated the stevia plant, also known as meethi tulsi, as the extract from its leaves is a sugar substitute. Unfortunately, Abhishek did not get any buyers, and his project tanked in 2016.

Amidst the mocking from neighbouring farmers and warnings from family to choose a better career path, Abhishek continued his research on organic farming.

To earn more money, my father would spend hours in the field growing huge quantities of paddy and wheat without understanding the market dynamics. I managed my farms as per the requirements of markets. I would grow only those plants that yielded high produce and money.

He took his family land on lease to conduct all kinds of experiments. While he stuck to the veggies he grew in his garden, he changed the watering method and even came up with his own organic fertilisers.

He also switched to drip irrigation, the benefits of which are many.

Drip irrigation is highly effective as it saves 90 per cent of water. Additionally, water goes directly to the soil, placing moisture exactly where it’s needed – at the roots. Since the water only penetrates the soil around the plant, the growth of weeds is reduced automatically. The uniformity maintained in watering the plants helps them grow faster.

It also saves time, as now Abhishek only needs 15-20 minutes to water one acre of land against 3-4 hours that was required earlier. Since the time required is less, the electricity used in pumping water from the motor has also decreased by 70 per cent.

In the first year, Abhishek was forced to use chemicals in some areas of his land. “Farmers in my neighbouring land use a lot of chemicals and pesticides to keep the insects at bay. So they crawled onto my land e destroying 40 per cent of my produce. To save the rest, I had to use chemicals in very little quantity.”

Learning from his mistakes, Abhishek cultivated his veggies in a smart way. He shifted his cropping schedule to a time when the other farmers were not engaged in this activity.

Another simple observation that helped Abhishek reduce the use of pesticides.

“The bio-pesticide do not work in very high temperatures, but fortunately, there were hardly one or two days when the temperature went beyond 45 degrees. I was able to significantly minimise pesticide in my farm,” he adds.

Last year, Abhishek explored vertical farming using bamboo to increase his production output and grow vegetables throughout the year.

He dug bamboos in the ground, maintaining a distance of eight feet between each bamboo. He used Galvanized Iron (GI) wire to erect and connect the bamboos.

Next, he covered the space between each bamboo with a network of plastic ropes shaped in a box. The plants spread on the ropes and grow that way.

This has increased my output by 80 per cent as the plants are less exposed to insects and extreme weather conditions like floods or torrential rains do not affect them. The workforce required to harvest the crops is also less. The best part is that this method uses 70 per cent less water, says Abhishek.

Abhishek has also installed a biogas unit on his farm that helps him convert agricultural waste into methane gas that his family uses for cooking!

Since he does farming throughout the year, his profits have increased significantly. From the produce he sells in the market, Abhishek claims to earns up to Rs 40,000 per day.

In Abhishek’s words, his journey from an engineer to a farmer is full of learnings and mistakes, but he is proud of having ventured into this territory.

Summing up his roller coaster experience, he concludes, “Farming is like understanding a newborn. At first, it might seem complicated, but once you pay attention and observe every move carefully, it becomes easier. Take time and get to know your plants.”

Also Read: Punjab Techie Quits High-Paying Job to Take up Natural Farming, Grows Organic Food!

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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Rahib Kolsawala, 29, a farmer based in Dungarpur, Rajasthan, belongs to a family that has been farming for at least 30 years now.

About 1.5 years ago, Rahib started practising organic farming and decided to prepare his own vermicompost.

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“It was a great idea with one major issue—the vermicompost would take ages to be prepared,” says Rahib.

Thankfully, Kaavyanam Organics, a startup, which is based in his village, came to his help.

An environment services organisation, Kaavyanam Organics, produces organic agro-inputs such as fertilisers and soil fertility tonics, provides consultancy services to farmers and organisations and conducts research projects on organic agriculture and waste management.

In Dungarpur Rajasthan, where the population is predominantly tribal, it helps the farmers follow organic agriculture as a conventional practice to help maintain soil quality while earning an equal yield.

Acting upon the suggestions made by Kaavyanam, Rahib started to line the base of the vermi bed with plant residue. After that, the organic waste in the vermi bed arranged in layers by alternating the plant residue with cow dung.

“This reduced the time almost by half,” says the happy farmer who is growing vegetables like capsicum and cucumber, using organic methods.

Today, Kaavyanam is helping approximately 70 farmers like Rahib.

Humble beginnings

Kaavyanam was founded in November 2017 by Umaima Ehtasham and Abhishek Kumar who first met each other in 2016 when they were participating in the Gandhi Fellowship programme.

We ended up having a conversation about the adverse effects of mismanaged waste in our respective cities, and decided to work on upcycling waste!” exclaims 24-year-old Umaima.

The duo started by collecting organic waste from six households and four juice shops near their hostel which was located in Dungarpur’s town area.

“We would return from work at around 8 pm, take our sack and go about collecting waste—about 40 kg on an average—and carry it up two floors to the terrace for composting. We successfully composted approximately 90 to 150 kg waste into compost and made a terrace garden,” says 26-year-old Abhishek.

During this time, the duo also visited a waste management facility which helped them understand the best practices and gaps in the existing models.

Since Dungarpur is one of the first organic districts in the state, they also visited the Agriculture Department and Krishi Vigyaan Kendra to understand more about the usage of organic fertilisers in the district.

“While our cities are overflowing with waste, there is a genuine gap in the demand and supply gap of organic fertilisers. So, we connected the dots and took on the challenge,” says Abhishek.

How they began their operations

Dungarpur Nagar Parishad was aiming to become the cleanest city in India under the Swachh Bharat Mission.

While the duo felt that considerable efforts were being put in to achieve that status, it was all at the administrative level, and public engagement and awareness were severely lacking.

“But in entirety we chose Kaavyanam to be set up in Dungarpur because there is a need and potential for organic production here. Also,we found that even if some people were open to organic production, there was a gap of availability of agro-inputs and knowledge, which we felt we could bridge,” explains Umaima.

That is why they chose this place to start out to not only educate the farmers but also others in the community.

“We collected the raw material (cow dung, agri-waste, organic waste) from villages near-by and sold the vermicompost to farmers and home gardeners. We produce 48 tonnes of vermicompost in a year from our first production facility. So far, we have been successful in gradually persuading farmers to switch to organic farming,” says Abhishek.

Kaavyanam’s organic fertiliser is used in over 25 acres of land solely dedicated to organic farming, across six villages—Dovra, Chitrethi, Nayagao Damdi, Punali, Navadera, Sulai—in Dungarpur.

“We were also able to reduce the cost of the fertiliser by 55%, making it highly affordable and accessible for marginal farmers,” says Umaima. They sell a kilo for Rs.7.

Currently, the startup is developing affordable and good quality organic agro-inputs (organic fertilisers and pesticides) to boost soil fertility, increasing water retention capacity and enhancing crop yield. Recently, they also set up an organic poultry farm.

Parallelly, they are also developing designs for environmentally sustainable, low-cost agro-inputs manufacturing facilities which can easily be replicated by farmers in the long run.

“We always focus on using locally available materials, especially post-harvest agricultural waste for product manufacturing,” says Umaima.

Abhishek mentions that they are also focusing on providing consultancy services for knowledge building on organic agriculture, supporting the farmers in setting up their own natural fertiliser manufacturing unit for their fields using resources available to them. Currently, they are also conducting research projects, organic waste management and agriculture.

Social and environmental impact

Abhishek and Umaima’s journey in setting up Kaavyanam has not been a bed of roses.

The biggest challenges they face daily are language and geographical constraints. Because of their remote location, they only have access to smaller markets and find it difficult to transport their products to markets situated at a distance.

Also, funding is an issue, and Umaima adds that it is sometimes difficult to explain to farmers that adopting organic agriculture would be better for the environment and also improve their yield.

The startup is currently bootstrapped and makes sales by selling their organic fertiliser to farmers in the area. Also, they work on projects, conduct workshops and also provide consultancy services to others for which they get paid. For farmers, the consultancy services are for free.

Also, are currently receiving support from the AIC (Atal Incubation Centre) in Banasthali to identify other channels that can help their business.

However, the duo is content and hopeful of what they have been able to achieve so far, and are especially proud of a campaign named ‘Recology’ which they spearheaded along with the city council in 2017-18.

“We conducted workshops to sensitise households on waste reduction and segregation. In the process, we surveyed about 300 households and eight schools and collectively impacted over 3500 lives. The campaign resulted in a 10% reduction in the mixed waste being collected from households. Later, we also submitted an audit report which contained recommendations on improving the overall management, waste handling and processing,” explains Abhishek.

The startup has now set up its second production facility with a capacity of 140 tonnes, thereby increasing their production of vermicompost to 188 tonnes in a year.

They also started producing liquid organic fertilisers and pesticides. So far, they have commercialised one product which is an organic fertiliser; organic pesticides are under field trials and testing phase. They are also developing products like foliar sprays and decomposers.

“Our second production facility has been developed on the ideals of keeping it asset-light, low-cost for farmers to easily adopt and replicate, which is our plan to develop models for the farmers to make them self-reliant,” says Abhishek.

So, what is in store for the startup in the future?

“I believe that when we start seeing the economic value in ‘being green,’ it will not only be an activity which is socially cool to associate with but also viable and doable. Living sustainably, reducing waste, growing and eating organic, should be conventional everyday practices in life. Only then, we will then become sustainable living practitioners and minimalists by choice,” says Umaima signing off.

You Might Also Like: Sailing to Farming: Himachal Man Leaves Rs 2.5L/Month to Grow Chemical-Free Food

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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Between the two bordering cities of Delhi and Noida, Aamir Ahmed lives two lives. One in the posh clubs of Delhi, and the other, in a quiet village which does not even have a concrete road. In the evenings, you might find him grooving on sizzling salsa numbers with Delhi’s elite, while in the morning, he is a humble farmer.

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All this, in just one day.

Growing up in a leafy corner of Delhi’s Nizamuddin, the only thing Aamir, now in his late 40s had in mind, was his love for nature and a mission to revive biodiversity in one of the world’s most polluted cities.

About three years ago, in 2006, he bought a 17-acre plot of land in Noida with his friend, Anand.

One thing led to another, and he soon ended up creating an entire ecosystem of butterflies, bees, trees, cows, birds and earthworms—all against the backdrop of an organic farm, aptly named “Rewild Life Biodiversity Farm”.

Aamir says, “We were looking for host plants for butterflies and realised that the colourful insects would not come if we used chemicals in the soil. So, to get organic cow dung as fertiliser, we started keeping cows. This gave birth to the dairy.”

Once the fertility of the soil started to improve, Aamir realised he could easily start growing organic vegetables; so, he came up with the idea of subletting small patches of his farm to city dwellers who wanted to eat fresh, organic, and nutritious food. The once-barren land was now brimming with harvests of brinjal, ladies finger, onion, corn, cabbage, gourd, carrot, radish, and watermelon.

Another friend, Jerry Bhardwaj, soon became a partner in the project. She led the creation of an herb garden by cultivating basil (tulsi), mint, lemongrass, aloe vera, thyme, and rosemary. Scattered over several parts of the farm, the citrus aroma of lemongrass helped keep away snakes and mosquitoes—two big concerns of city-dwellers while visiting a farm.

In the meantime, Aamir’s dream of raising a full-fledged butterfly park in the middle of the farm, located in the floodplains of the Hindon river, started taking shape. “Few would believe the kind of biodiversity that Delhi harboured even twenty or thirty years ago. I wanted to contribute my bit to the environment and since I love butterflies, I thought of building a butterfly park,” he says.

An entire section of the farm is dedicated to a butterfly garden. The idea is simple—grow several host and nectar plants, and the butterflies will come in naturally.

The little winged insects also need a safe refuge to hide from predators and rough weather, for which Aamir built a large depression on one end of the butterfly park.

Initially, only 2-3 species were present there. With the help of citrus plants and others like milkweed, curry leaves, and Lantanas, the farm became home to at least 18 species of butterflies, including the Plain Tiger, Blue Pansy, Painted Lady, Large Cabbage White, Lime, Striped Tiger and Common Mormon in about 30 months.

The biggest challenge with having too many butterflies around a cropland is the foraging behaviour of caterpillars. “Birds keep a check on caterpillars. Nature takes care of itself. We are just trying to follow nature,” quips Aamir.

The only missing thing in the farm ecosystem was a water body.

“I was looking for options on how to create a wetland when someone suggested using the slurry waste from the dairy and draining it into another patch of the plot. In just a few months, the wetland was formed, and now it is a permanent nesting place for birds,” the urban farmer says, explaining how it is also recharging groundwater level.

The Rewild Life Biodiversity Farm is an example of what an ‘integrated farm’ can do not just for biodiversity but also for crop productivity. The presence of birds, bees, and butterflies improves the productivity of the farm due to quick and easy pollination. The cows provide dung that is used as fertiliser, while their urine is mixed with chillies to create bio-pesticide which keeps bugs away.

Another example of the transformation is the texture and composition of the soil. “When we started working here, the soil was very sandy. It could not hold water. We introduced earthworms and put out a lot of cow dung all over the farm. The soil you see now is not the same as it used to be,” he says.

Just like the mist irrigation system, that creates a rainbow-like magical spectacle in sunny afternoons, most things in the farm were created in DIY (Do It Yourself)-style.

Already off the electricity grid, the farm is run on solar energy. “We follow nature. Even at our office, we made it a point not to install an AC because a cooler works just as well even during peak summers.”

Sometimes, enthusiastic farmers from neighbouring villages come to seek advice from the new-age farmer on how to convert to organic farming, given its demand. To this, Aamir says, “They let the soil die and allow the plant to grow on chemicals. All I tell them is to feed the soil, and the soil will automatically feed the plant.”

The oasis of greenery, situated next to a concrete jungle of high-rise societies of Noida, is now an open classroom for nature lovers.

Along with his partner Jerry, Aamir is now transforming the farm into a fun-filled classroom for school students and corporate executives. He employs labourers periodically, as per the requirement of the season.

“Students from 7-8 schools from Delhi have already done workshops with us. The idea is to teach them about where we get our food. Most youngsters have never plucked carrots from the field or seen the vine of a watermelon crop. The more they understand how food is grown, the more they respect the farmer and the food itself. Apathy towards farmers turns into empathy once they come close to the work we do,” he shares.

Aamir now plans to try out different activities at the farm with nature as the backdrop. He elaborates, “We want different groups of people, from cyclists to bikers and joggers, to come to the farm and learn about how nature works. We are also planning a dog’s day out where pet owners can come to the farm and play with their dogs.”

As someone so passionately involved in farming and nature, it is hard to imagine Aamir as a dance choreographer. Typically, he starts his day at the farm at around 6.30 am, and then as the sun sets in, he puts on his dancing shoes.

For the last 15 or so years, he has been teaching different styles of ballroom and Latin dance to young corporate executives in Delhi and Gurugram.

His experience of conducting dance classes help him rope corporates and schools for nature education workshops. “Dancing boosts your confidence, especially when you have to give presentations as you get rid of stage fright,” Aamir says.

Until a few years ago, he also ran a carpet export business. “I didn’t want to die rolling out one carpet after another and so I moved on. I could have danced away to glory, as they say, but I chose the farm,” he explains.

Like farming, dancing too is a passion. Both dancing and farming are stress busters, but nature has an edge.

Not worried about financial returns from the farm project, Aamir, a bachelor, makes it clear that it is not like a commercial farm where you grow and sell vegetables to make a profit.

“The only thing we want to do is to create awareness. It is more of an environmental education farm. With workshops, we want people to acquire skills on how to create biodiversity hotspots in and around their houses. Doing that is no rocket science,” he says.

Also Read: 5 Engineers Who Became Organic Farmers to Earn Better & Live Healthier!

If you find him in a good mood at the farm someday, you might spot him breaking into a dance just like a peacock swaying his feathers when the monsoon rain is in full glory.

To know more, look up Rewild Life Biodiversity Farms on Facebook, here.

(Written by Nikhil Agarwal and Edited by Shruti Singhal)

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While our awareness about the food that we consume⁠—where it comes from, the way it was processed⁠—is increasing, there is still a lack of sustainable and affordable solutions that ensure our food does not cause us harm.

This is one of the primary reasons why more and more people are advocating self-farming.

Delhi based Farmstacks is an organisation that doesn’t just advocate self-farming but also recommends that you adopt sustainable methods for it.

Speaking to The Better India (TBI) about how the organisation came about, Sharad Rai, one of its founders, says, “Raghav (Varma) and I have been friends since our engineering college days. A couple of years ago, we decided to start a venture that provides fresh produce to people in Delhi. Our concern was that people don’t scrutinise their vegetables enough. Ironically, they are more careful about purchasing electronics. Isn’t it essential for us to have the same concern for the food that fuels us then?”

Raghav and Sharad were joined by Karsan Chaudhary and Vaibhav Kaushik, who were already experimenting with sustainable urban farming methods.

Together, they solved the riddle of how a person living in an urban space can grow their food sustainably, without investing too much time and money.

The answer? Hydroponics.

As intriguing and adventurous as self-farming is, it can also be confusing. How do we know the soil, amount of water and space a plant requires to grow successfully?

Well, Farmstacks is attempting to answer these questions in their day-long workshop about hydroponics.

“Hydroponics requires very less land and is perfect for urban spaces like balconies and terraces. The method is done only in water, and nothing touches the soil. Since the water runs through all the roots of the plants, it circulates the fertilisers and nutrients with near perfection. The plants absorb about 97% of the nutrients. The water is recirculated through the same pipeline, so unlike what you might imagine, the water-dependent agriculture method does not waste water or even use more than what an agricultural land might use,” Sharad says.

So, if you are interested in cultivating your food, which, in Farmstack’s words, is “even better than organic,” you should enrol in the workshop that will be held on 14th and 15th September.

Space and time is not an issue because the design that they offer is such that you can grow nearly 100 plants in a 10 ft x 10 ft x 10 ft space.

To ensure that everyone who attends the workshop is benefitted, Farmstacks will teach you about a variety of vegetables and fruits that you might want to grow.

Lettuce, broccoli, tomatoes and cabbage are some plants that they will cover, but if you wish to know about the space, water and nutrients that, for example, onions require, you are free to ask the team.

Some more things that you can look forward to in the workshop are as follows:

• An introduction to how this farming method is fit for a city dweller.
• How you will benefit from farming at home.
• An in-depth explanation about how you can start a hydroponic farm at home.
• How you can start the agriculture method on a commercial level.
• The different equipment you’ll need for these methods as well as how a domestic level farm can be built using readily available equipment.
• Busting any myth that you may carry about hydroponics.

This promises to be a day well spent, where you will get valuable information about how you can grow your food at your own home.

Intrigued? Click on this link to find out about other such Hydroponics workshops.

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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At the crack of dawn, a group of children aged between six and twelve hurriedly make their way through the green fields in Guddad Hulikatti village of Karnataka’s Dharwad district to the hall where they learn yoga.

Worried about getting reprimanded for being late, the kids start warming up for Ashtanga yoga before their teacher arrives.

Have you ever wanted to grow your own food and vegetables on your rooftop? Click here to check out this mini hydroponic growing system to eat fresh food.

“Are your muscles relaxed?” says Mallkiarjungoud Patil, their guru, emerging from one end of the hall situated at the end of a farm opposite his house. The yoga class goes on for an hour after which they go back to their guru’s home to eat a fresh and healthy breakfast consisting of millet-made dosa or idli. Later, they chart their way to their school.

These children belong to economically backward families, and for them, Patil is their guru, their mentor and more importantly, their anchor.

The 68-year-old yoga teacher-cum-organic farmer has adopted these kids to give them an education, and a healthier present and a brighter future.

“Being uneducated, we cannot help our son in studies. We are happy Patil sir is helping our son in his studies,” say the farmer parents of Suprit, one of the children adopted by Patil. 

When the children return from their school, Patil helps them with their homework and gives them practical lessons on farming.

For the last 30 odd years, Patil’s routine has been more or less the same except for a few things like switching to organic food, teaching yoga and his determination to help impoverished children get an education and a healthy lifestyle.

When Patil was diagnosed a severe back pain in 1986, he was asked to include yoga in his everyday schedule. He joined a yoga class in Hubli, where he had been working in the city’s Postal Department for ten years.

Yoga reduced Patil’s pain considerably within a year and ignited a new passion in him, “I was so bowled over by the benefits of yoga that I decided to learn it and teach others,” he tells The Better India.

After completing a diploma in yoga from Karnataka University, Patil started his own part-time classes in 1989 while still working. In his yoga career spanning three decades, Patil claims to have taught yoga to around 20,000 people.

Whether it is practicing intense power yoga or soft moving meditation, a healthy and nutritious diet is necessary for energy. I would tell my students to consume chemical-free food but they had very little idea about its source. The organic fad had not reached Hubli yet, adds Patil.

The thought of not having natural food troubled him all throughout and eventually pushed him to pursue organic farming. So until 2010, he continued with his job to fend for his family and once his three children became financially independent, Patil took an early retirement to make natural food accessible.

He moved back to his village with his wife in 2010 and took back his family’s four-acre land that he had given on lease to other farmers. The land was almost infertile due to chemicals and fertilisers that were being used on it and it took Patil nearly two years to make the farm toxin-free.

Meanwhile, he underwent a training for 3-4 months in organic farming from Karnataka University and soon, he started cultivating millet and gradually introduced other plantations like wheat, rice, groundnut, banana, mango, drumstick, maize, ragi and papaya.

Patil believes in growing plants that have high nutritional values coupled with other unique features.

Take for example millets which is a less water intensive crop and thus is drought-resistant. It is a superfood rich in fibre and minerals like iron, magnesium and calcium and has a long shelf life. As for Taiwan yellow, a papaya variety, it is rich in antioxidants and reduces the risk of heart diseases. Plus, they are sturdy and do not get easily damaged.

He uses the ancient method of preparing fertiliser, Jeevamrutha. It is a mixture of cow urine and dung, jaggery and water that can be prepared in seven days.

“I mix ten litres of cow’s urine and dung with one kilo of jaggery, one cup of soil and water. I put this mixture in a pit of 200 litre capacity, and leave it undisturbed. It provides essential nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium to the plants,” says Patil.

Composting is another method to prepare organic fertiliser. In a 3×10 feet pit he adds wet waste and covers it with cow dung and water. The top layer of the pit is filled with waste leaves. He leaves the mix for three months after which the waste converts into compost. On an average, he produces one tonne of compost every 90 days.

“These natural agri inputs have improved the quality of soil and food and land fertility,” says Patil.

As for watering his fields, Patil uses the drip irrigation system to use water judiciously.

Having a water-saving technique in place was a crucial step. I dug a ten feet deep pit to store the rainwater. To water the farm, I use the borewell water and some of the water from the pit. The pit has also helped in recharging groundwater tables, he shares.

“This system also saves water and time as it takes me only three hours to water the entire farm as against the six hours that I wasted earlier,” he adds.

Patil did not directly find success in organic farming. The crops were destroyed in the first two years of farming and he faced heavy losses in terms of food and money. Only after studying his own plants was he able to develop ways that would suit his plants.

From cultivating six quintals of millets to 1.5 lakh mangoes per year, Patil not only grows organic food but also sells them in the market.

He has a tie-up with an organic store in Hubli and a company that markets organic produce. He keeps aside a part of the produce for his students in his village and across 15 other villages where he teaches yoga.

The Way Forward

Patil hopes to increase the number of yoga students to promote healthy lifestyle via yoga and intake of nutritional food.

As for the organic farming, he is currently chalking out a plan to conduct workshops in his village for farmers on organic means to grow food.

“At 68, if I am able to do the kind of exertion required for farming and yoga it is only because of exercise and healthy food . . . these two things have changed my life for the better. I wish to pass on my knowledge to other farmers and make them independent of pesticides,” he says.

It is not everyday you come across people like Patil. He could have retired and had an easy life. But he wanted to give back to the society, even if it meant in a tiny village like Guddad Hulikatti.

Also Read: Meet Delhi’s Aamir Ahmed, An Organic Farmer By Day & Salsa Teacher By Night

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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How well do you know about the origins of those vegetables you cook daily? I bet not many would be able to answer this question with a resounding, ‘I do’. Finding chemical-free fruits and veggies in the market is a difficult task especially in big cities like Mumbai. No wonder then more and more people are opting for self-farming.

Attend this one-day Hydroponics workshop in Mumbai! Click on this link to get more details and book your seat.

With space being an issue in Mumbai, sustainable agriculture like hydroponics is the perfect solution. And city-based Techxellance teaches you how to set up your Hydroponics farm.

And Mumbaikars are in luck! On 14 September, Rahul and Akash Parekh, the director of the organisation, are holding a one-day workshop in the city to teach you all about hydroponics.

Rahul Mhaskar, co-founder of Techxellance shares with The Better India the idea behind starting this project. “Our core aim is to provide residue-free produce to consumers. Farming communities are affected by natural calamities, and the land itself is adversely affected by both climate change and human activities like spraying of harmful chemicals. The quality of food is thus spiralling down. Hydroponics provides guaranteed quality vegetables and fruits,” he says.

Here’s what you can expect from the workshop:

• An introduction to hydroponics and how it is an easy way to start farming at home.
  You will also learn a DIY course on setting up a hydroponics farm in your house. This will also include a rough outline of how much space and how many plants one needs to satisfy the food needs of all house members. For instance, a family of three will require about 30 plants grown in a 15-square-feet area.
• You will also get to see how vast spaces are not always necessary to grow a farm. This workshop is set to focus only on edibles. But whether you want to grow only strawberries or a variety of vegetables, Rahul and Akash will provide adequate guidance.

• You will also be shown how a hydroponics farm can be grown in a commercial state.
  Techxellance will provide you with a kit to kickstart your hydroponics farm at your home. The kit is a stand-alone Deep Water Culture system which comes with germination media, net cup, grow media, nutrients, air pump & seeds to grow leafy plant/herbs at home hydroponically.

“We will explain why we need to adopt modern ways of agriculture in the current scenario. Our technology is advancing, and so, growing food must not be left behind. Not only do we as a society, need to grow sufficient food, but we also need to grow good quality food,” Akash shares.

If you are looking forward to growing your toxin-free, organic food at home, then book the one-day 14 September workshop right now!

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

All images courtesy of Techxellance.

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Organic farming is the trend of the hour as many individuals across India are choosing to grow their food, instead of bagging the pesticide-laden, hybrid greens from supermarket shelves.

However, Rekha Reshmik from Kozhikode, Kerala has pioneered a unique method of farming which yields double the profits as well as the harvest. 

In her backyard, spanning no more than a few hundred square feet, she has implemented aquaponics⁠—a technique that connects pisciculture with organic farming. 

Now set up an organic garden all by yourself. Shop from our 100% eco-friendly farm supplies and accessories.

In just five years, Rekha’s venture, Annapoorna Aquaponics, has grown by leaps and bounds and fetched her multiple awards. In fact, she is the recent district-level winner for modern fish farming. 

Besides the accolades, she also earns a sizable monthly income alongside fresh, organic ingredients for her self-sufficient kitchen.

A graduate in Mathematics, Rekha previously worked as a software developer in Kozhikode. However, as her son was growing up, she found the corporate job inherently taxing and decided to quit. Soon, she started browsing options to earn from home. 

“I have always had a knack for gardening and farming, so I started to look into traditional farming methods. I interacted with numerous farmers to learn how farming has been practised in our state for ages. At one point, goat farming piqued my interest,” recalls Rekha, in a conversation with The Better India. 

It did not take her long to discover that goat farming was not an option for a one-person army like herself. Also, traditional farming would not be feasible in her area, which is affected by acute water shortage in the summer months. 

Rekha did not allow his setback to let her down and started exploring other options. 

“That was how I chanced upon a few YouTube videos and tutorials on aquaponics. The idea immediately struck a chord with me,” Rekha shares. 

The origin of aquaponics can be traced back to ancient civilisations, especially in the history of the Aztecs and the Chinese. This type of polyculture farming traditionally combined the culture of common freshwater fish with staple grains like paddy. 

In modern-day aquaponics, a growth bed for vegetables surrounds a fish pond of approximately one-third of its area. The ammoniacal excretory product of the fish is converted into nitrate by microbes via nitrification, which serves as a highly nutritious additive for plant growth.

The water from the fish pond is constantly channelised into the plant bed, and the vegetables grow faster than regular farming. The water is recirculated back into the fish pond, and the cycle continues. 

Rekha has brilliantly replicated this method on her farm. She mainly produces Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia (GIFT) fish and vegetables like yam, ivy gourd, bitter gourd, millet, turmeric as well as spinach, brahmi (water hyssop) and chillies.

“She has always been a very talented person. We have seen her pursue a lot of different things⁠—be it sand painting or goat farming. At one point, she had even bought three goats. Later, she switched to aquaponics and found her calling in it,” shares Rekha’s relative, Krishnankutty.

In June 2014, Rekha launched her solo aquaponics venture under the name Annapoorna Aquaponics. She mastered the method entirely on her own, her main tutor being YouTube videos of foreign hobbyists, and today, she conducts regular hands-on workshops to teach aquaponics to other enthusiasts across Kozhikode. 

A board with the disclaimer “pesticide & chemical-free” welcomes people at the entrance of her farm. A fish tank worth 40,000-litre capacity houses over 4,000 Tilapia fish. A sub-immersible pump redirects water from the tank into several gravelled grow beds for vegetables. 

The journey has not been a cakewalk for Rekha and her husband, Reshmik. First, the locals brushed her idea aside as a ‘joke’⁠—since aquaponics appeared to be a form of water-intensive farming, which would be difficult in a water-scarce region.

Then, due to additional power consumption required for the venture, Rekha ran pillar to post pleading agricultural officials for a farm subsidy. But, her limited farming space made her ineligible.

Finally, one of the officials termed aquaponics ‘a criminal offence’ and asked her to shut down her farm at the earliest. 

The couple were at their wit’s end when as a last resort, Rekha’s husband decided to file an RTI query to know the status of their application. 

“We found that our application was grossly misinterpreted by the officials, leading to all our hurdles. When we submitted the detailed guidelines of our operations, we finally received a nod from the officials,” recounts Rekha. 

“Today, many people around us have adopted aquaponics in their own homes, which once seemed impossible. This is all thanks to inspiration from Rekha and her consistent guidance,” shares her neighbour, Shiji. 

Rekha wishes to popularise her initiative throughout Kerala, where thousands of lakes and water bodies are lying unutilised or on the verge of encroachment. She believes that such a widespread endeavour will multiply the state’s produce, manifold. 

If you are interested in Aquaponics farming, visit Rekha’s Facebook page for more details.

Also Read: Delhi Engineer Turns Urban Kisan, Earns Rs 40K/Day From Organic Farming!

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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Turning hard work into smart work, Vijaya Kala, a part-time farmer and a full-time tax-auditor is increasing her food output without toiling under the sun for hours or hopelessly waiting for the rains.

Vijaya is a resident of Kerala’s Karunagappally town, who six years ago, opted for farming techniques which were less-labour intensive and more efficient, including polyhouse and Precision Agriculture (PA) and started growing plants and vegetables.

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Speaking to The Better India about the benefits of her farming techniques, the 39-year-old says,

“PA is site-specific farming, which means that crops and veggies are grown based on weather patterns, humidity and soil temperature. Instead of using one single approach for all the vegetables, each plant is treated differently. As for the polyhouse, veggies are grown under controlled climatic conditions, and thus, there are fewer chances of crop damage. Plus, food can be grown in a polytunnel around the year. It also keeps the insects and pests at bay.”

Vijaya’s motivation to grow organic vegetables in her backyard was neither a life-changing experience nor a childhood passion that was reignited.

It was in fact, a discussion among friends about growing food at home that pushed her to go online and research about the topic. In no time, the research turned to a full-fledged plan that she presented to the state’s Agriculture Department to avail farming subsidies.

With no farming land of her own, she installed two polytunnels comprising 100 square metres, one on her terrace and the other one in the house’s backyard at an investment cost of 1.20 lakh (50,000 of which was from the government subsidy.) Additionally,she also has an acre of land (taken on lease) to extend vegetable farming through PA .

From veggies like tomatoes, capsicum, radish, onion, spinach, bitter gourd, cabbage, beans to flowers like orchid and marigold, all the food is grown organically. She prepares her own agri inputs like fertiliser which is a mixture of cow dung, urine and water.

As for the polyhouse process, Kala makes a bed comprising cow dung and neem cake (residue obtained from neem seed kernels). The bed is covered with mulching sheet drilled with holes where the seeds are planted.

Water is supplied through a drip irrigation system through pipes. “In drip irrigation, water is directly provided to the roots. It minimises evaporation, thus retaining the moisture and reducing the volume of water given to each plant,” says Kala.

In the beginning, she faced crop losses and damages, but with time, the plants got used to her home-made fertiliser.

“The rapid growth of weeds and fungus would damage many of my plants initially. But not once was I tempted to use pesticides to avoid the losses. Instead, I focused on improving the fertiliser, and even now, I have not found the perfect recipe. But the results get better by the day,” she explains.

On average, Kala’s farm produces veggies, every two months. She sells the produce in the market earns a monthly profit of around Rs 20,000.

“I sell them on a rotational basis. For example, if half of the vegetables are sold in June, the other half are sold in July. I also grow and sell vegetable saplings⁠—in fact, recently I sold 500 red papaya saplings in my neighbourhood,” she exclaims!

With an aim to spread her knowledge and expertise with citizens who are keen on growing or developing a farm in their backyard, Kala holds interactions on her social media platform.

Though she attends to the farm after 5 pm on weekdays and gets a chance to dedicate more time only on weekends, she takes it very seriously.

“It is tough dividing my time between job, family and farm, but farming is something I have become passionate about. It is not an extracurricular activity, but a part of my daily routine now. I wish to continue it for as long as I can,” says Kala.

All the images are sourced from Vijaya Kala.

You can reach out to Vijaya Kala here.

Also Read: 28 Years, 10,000 Episodes & One Voice: Meet AIR Kerala’s ‘Radio Agriculturalist’!

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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Vanrajsinh Gohil was born in 1988 in the Junavadar village of Gujarat’s Bhavnagar district and believes that his destiny was pre-decided⁠.

“I was born in a farmer’s family and that is what I was expected to be,” he tells The Better India.

After completing his Higher Secondary Education in 2012, he joined the family’s cotton plantation. While he enjoyed his work, he was not content with the farming methods.

Grow your own organic food at home. Check out this mini hydroponic growing system that helps you grow your own vegetables, herbs, flowers and air cleaning plants wherever you like. 

“Using chemicals and pesticides on the newly-born, nutritious plants did not feel right. I could see the difference in colour and structure of the crops post spraying. But none of my family members had any knowledge of a safe alternative,” he says.

With no other choice at his disposal, he continued using harmful chemicals to keep insects and pests away for the next couple of years.

However, destiny’s part was not over.

In 2016, he reconnected with his long lost friend, who is also a farmer, and when the two got talking, he expressed his displeasure with the use of chemicals and pesticides.

So, his friend introduced him to Subhash Palekar, an Indian agriculturist, who was awarded the a Padma Shri in 2016.

Fondly known as ‘Krishi ka Rishi,’ Palekar developed the concept of Zero Budget Natural Farming (ZBNF) or Subhash Palekar Natural Farming (SBNF) that requires almost no monetary investment.

The crops are grown naturally by replacing chemicals with eco-friendly fertiliser. You can read more about Palekar here.

A year later, Vanrajsinh registered for Palekar’s organic farming classes in Ahmedabad.

“I interacted with a lot of farmers at the 6-day training class whose stories inspired me to start from scratch. I acquired the farming knowledge from Palekar sir and now all I had to do was shift to natural farming,” he adds.

Developing A Model Farm

As anticipated, his family refused to even entertain the idea. Practising natural farming on their 40 bigha land was a strict no.

“They feared that the crops would be damaged in the absence of pesticides. Although it was hard for them to trust an amateur like me, my father agreed to let me experiment in a half-acre plot of land,” says the 31-year-old.

He applied the dual methods of multi-layer cropping and SBNF to grow vegetables and fruits. Multi-layer cropping optimises the use of land as more than two crops of varying heights are grown in close proximity.

Explaining the benefits, Vanrajsinh says, “The technique uses light and water more efficiently when compared to crops planted separately. This less distance also keeps insects at bay.”

He planted desi papaya seeds in the outer circle and Vegetables like brinjal, bitter gourd, turmeric, choli (beans), peanut, mung bean sprouts, cluster beans, sponge gourd and chillies in the inner circle.

He used dry leaves as a mulch instead of plastic sheets. Mulching is a gardening technique that suppresses weeds and conserves water in crop production. On the mulching sheet, he dug three feet deep holes at intervals where the seeds are sown.

“The deep holes prevent the crops from getting damaged during heavy rains. They absorb excess water and in turn recharge the groundwater,” he explains.

He also prepared jeevamrutham, a natural pesticide made from cow urine, dung and jaggery.

“I would use 200 litres once every 15 days, for the plot of land. As per Palekar’s observations, one gram of cow dung contains anything between 300 to 500 crore microorganisms, which decompose biomass on soil and convert it into nutrients for the plants. Not only does the pesticide ensure that insects do not damage the crops but it also improves soil fertility,” he says.

In addition to all this, Vanrajsinh has opted for the drip irrigation method to water the crops, and that has reduced the usage of water by 70 per cent.

Reaping the Benefits

Six months after incorporating the SPNF model, Vanrajsinh harvested the vegetables and hired two people who opened a small stall in the market in Palitana, a small town in his district, to sell them.

Even though he increased the rates of vegetables by 30 per cent of the current market rate, he marketed the vegetables as healthy and 100 per cent natural and thanks to his marketing skills, all the vegetables were sold in a week.

Next, he formed a WhatsApp group of customers who were willing to purchase the produce from his farm.

“I would send a message on the group once the vegetables left from the farm so that they could buy them when they were fresh,’ he says.

For the next three months, Vanrajsinh continued the process and then decided to shift the focus to the cotton plantation.

His regular customers soon started missing the fresh produce and demanded that he re-open the stall and also bring other vegetables besides the ones he was growing on his farm.

“I was stunned to see the effect of natural farming. Without wasting any time, I got in touch with other farmers in the village who were producing other vegetables organically. I collaborated with two other farmers and re-opened the stall,” he says.

Over a period of time, the yield, customers and Vanrajsinh’s income increased.

“I made a profit of Rs 2 lakh in 6-8 months. My family members also came on board after seeing the success of the model farm,” he says.

Despite its success, Vanrajsinh confesses that SPNF gave him a hard time, in the beginning.

“I used to spend my entire day on the farm studying the progress of the crops and effects of spraying jeevamrutham. Some of the seeds even failed, but that helped me learn about the behaviour patterns of plants. After a period of time, the seeds got used to natural fertiliser. I highly recommend this method to every farmer.”

Banking on the success of organic farming, he is now implementing the budget farming technique to grow cotton in his family’s land, in addition to growing vegetables and fruits the half acre plot, “We will get the results in the next few months, and I am positive about it.”

He is also working on his newly formed YouTube channel, where will post videos about his farming methods, “I want other farmers also to adopt the technique, but not everyone has the time to attend the training by Palekar sir. So, I will give them free classes through YouTube.”

If you wish to get in touch with Vanrajsinh Gohil, write to him at Vanraj111988@gmail.com

Also Read: Haryana Engineer Scripts Success in Zero-Budget Natural Farming!

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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Everyone has tried their hands at converting waste into something useful during the art and craft classes at school, (best out of waste, remember?). Reused ice-cream sticks turned to photo frames or old CDs changed to toy houses.

For many of us, those waste management lessons did not go beyond school. But Prabhakar Mankoji utilises his farm waste to his advantage and even generates revenue from it.

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Fourteen years ago, the resident of Karnataka’s Kadale village incorporated the concept of waste-to-wealth in his agricultural practice and today, the 58-year-old farmer not only saves Rs 4 lakh annually by producing organic compost but also has doubled his income.

No mean feat right?

Mankoji’s waste management mantra is to use his farm waste to generate vermicompost which helps him naturally fertilise 160 coconut trees, 1,000 arecanut trees, betel leaf climbers, pepper and cashew crop, and green fodder on his eight-acre ancestral land.

The push for organic farming for Mankoji came in 2005 when the state government introduced a scheme which provided subsidies to farmers who showed commitment to replace chemical fertilisers and pesticides with organic alternatives.

“My father was a farmer who used pesticides and yet insects damaged the plant growth. I heard some village elders talk about farming with natural means. I thought of trying it out and applied for the scheme,” says Mankoji who had never heard of vermicomposting.

Yet, a determined Mankoji took guidance from fellow farmers, designed a plan and presented it to the officials to avail the subsidy.
He studied both, composting and vermicomposting and opted for the latter for multifold reasons

I found vermicomposting to be less labour-intensive as the worms break down the organic waste faster and even fragments and aerates the waste. It can be done round the year, helps in reducing the water loss as vermicompost retains moisture. Plus, it enhances the growth of plants, explains Mankoji.

Mankoji received a subsidy of Rs 60,000 and a loan of Rs 1.2 lakh which he used to install eight composting pits in his farm.

A year after making the organic switch, he realised that the vermicompost had not only improved quality of the soil but also increased the yield and quality of food.

For instance, his output of arecanut increased two-fold from ten quintal to 25 from which he earns up to Rs 20,000/kg. His pepper plantation also saw a hike from ten kg to over three quintals and fetches him Rs 300/kg. Meanwhile the coconut production rose by 3,000 coconuts.

The Vermicompost Process:

1. Each pit or tank is twenty feet long and four feet wide with a depth of 2.5 feet. All the tanks are covered with a five sq ft of mesh to keep rats and frogs at bay.
2. Mankoji has six cows, two calves and one buffalo. A pipe connects the shed to an underground tank. The cow urine and water used for washing the animals is transferred to the tank every 15 days which has a capacity of 15,000 litres. Once the tank is full, the liquid is led to a biogas unit, placed close to the shed.
3. Mankoji deposits the dry farm waste like leaves and twigs in the vermicompost tanks which is then covered with the slurry from the biogas unit. He also buys additional dry waste from other farmers.
4. Once the tank is filled, he introduces worms in the tank. Though not necessary but Mankoji suggests using cow dung water to quicken the reproduction process of worms.
5. The tanks are covered with mesh and he sprays water in them once every week.
6. After a month, he removes five inches of compost and again coats the waste with cow dung slurry. He follows this procedure till all the waste is converted into compost.
7. On an average, it takes over a month to produce 25 quintals of compost from each of the eight pits.

He uses the majority of the compost in his farm and sells the surplus in the market or to his fellow farmers.

I sell one quintal of compost for Rs 2,000 and if I sell all my compost, it can annually fetch me up to Rs four lakh. In other words I would require rupees four lakh worth of compost to practice organic farming and I am saving that money by producing my own compost, he shares.

Back then one lakh seemed a lot but Mankoji also knew that it would be a one-time investment that would give returns in the long run.

I am just a tenth-pass and not educated enough to preach about the process or even give my expertise. But from my experience I can recommend vermicomposting, especially to those farmers who have space in their farms. When the input is less and output is more, it is a sure shot way to know that the process is profitable, smiles Mankoji.

It is these little steps that lead to big results. Composting house-hold waste at home or applying the same process to convert farm waste into a revenue-making resource, such initiatives are not impossible. It only needs an unwavering decision and will to make the switch from toxic to healthy and see our lives change for the better.

Also Read: Chennai Duo Stop 5000+ Tonnes of Waste From Reaching Landfills, Help Poor Farmers!

Image Courtesy: Prabakar Mankoji

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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Bathed in the brilliant sunlight under the sky burnished blue, the 15-acre countryside farm belonging to Srikanth and Srilatha welcomes you with a tantalising aroma of ready-to-pluck mangoes.

Nestled in the remote village of Mamidimada in the Wanaparthy District of Telangana, is a natural farm run by the elderly duo who have one aim—to live a life in tune with nature.

Apart from producing 100 per cent naturally-grown and ripened mangoes that have found patrons across Hyderabad, they have also been using Subash Palekar’s Zero Budget Natural Farming Method (ZBNF) to grow an array of crops.

Some of these include organic, indigenous rice varieties, millets, moringa, castor, timber, Malabar neem, and teak. While most of these are commercially sold, the couple also grows everything their kitchen needs.

These include lentils (Toor Dal, Urad Dal), seasonal vegetables and spices like chillies, tomatoes, carrots, beans, cauliflower, cabbage, and all leafy vegetables.

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How it all began

When Srikanth took up agriculture, he had no background in farming. Despite completing his graduation in Commerce in the late 70s from Nizam College, he had to return to his village as he had the responsibility of the family’s ancestral land. Thus, he moved out of Hyderabad and settled in Mamidimada.

Once he married Srilatha, the duo started managing the farm together. Back in the day, their major crops included paddy, castor, cotton, maize, groundnut, jowar etc.

The couple started their mango orchard, the highlight of their farm, in 2014 using the ZBNF method. Of the 20-acre-plot, this seasonal orchard takes up 15 acres now.

Speaking to The Better India, “We had practised farming all our lives, but it wasn’t until our son, Satwick, had completed his MBA in Rural Management that we explored the blessings of natural farming and started moving our efforts into natural farming and agroforestry,” says Srikanth.

Satwick, their son, picked up an interest in farming during his days at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand, Gujarat and spoke to his father about the SPNF method.

“For the longest time my dad felt that farming wasn’t a profitable career choice or source of income. But during my student days, I had the opportunity to meet many progressive farmers. That’s where I picked up an interest in farming. Organic farming was too complicated, but I was looking for something more simpler yet sustainable. That’s when I came across SPNF and decided to help my parents practice it too,” informs Satwick.

What is SPNF/ZBNF?

Zero budget natural farming (ZBNF) or Subhash Palekar Natural Farming (SPNF) is a chemical-free method of agriculture that relies on traditional Indian practices instead. It was developed by Maharashtra agriculturist and Padma Shri recipient Subhash Palekar, in the mid-1990s, as a protest against perils of Green Revolution which used excessive chemical fertilisers, pesticides and intensive irrigation.

The idea is to eliminate the costs associated with these external inputs completely because Palekar believes these costs to be the leading cause of indebtedness and suicide among farmers, degradation of the environment and loss of soil fertility in the long run.

To reduce the cost of production and turn farming into a “zero budget” exercise for small farmers, some of the methods under this model include:

Jeevamrutham

This refers to the use of fermented microbial culture to provide the soil with nutrients, and increase the activity of microorganisms and earthworms in the soil. The use of jeevamrut also prevents fungal and bacterial plant diseases.

Preparation of jeevamrutham:
– In 200 litres of water in a barrel, add 10 Kg fresh cow dung, 5 to 10 litres aged cow urine, and 2 Kg of Jaggery. Some even add 2 Kg of pulse flour and a handful of soil from the farm.
– Stir the solution well and let it ferment for 48 hours in the shade.
– The solution is now ready for application. 200 litres of jeevamrutham is sufficient for one acre of land.

While the farm operations are supervised by 64-year-old Srikanth, the preparation of jeevamrutham, its application, maintenance of trees and harvesting and irrigation is done by their workers.

Beejamruth

It is a treatment used for seeds, seedlings or any planting material. It is effective in protecting young roots from fungus as well as from soil-borne and seed-borne diseases that commonly affect plants after the monsoons. It is composed using local cow dung, cow urine, lime and soil. You can coat any crop seeds with beejamrita by hand; dry them well and then use them for sowing.

“The seeds that we use on our farm are indigenous and sourced from other farmers contacted through Facebook groups,” shares Srikanth. He also adds how they have created their own bank of seeds by multiplying the varieties they had sourced over the years.

Acchadana or Mulching:

Mulch is a layer of material applied to the surface of the soil to conserve soil moisture, improving its fertility and health, reduce weed growth and enhance the visual appeal of the area. There are three types of mulching: soil mulch, straw mulch and live mulch.

Soil mulching protects the topsoil during tilling. It improves aeration and water retention in the soil. Straw mulching uses dried biomass waste like dead material of any living being (plants, animals, etc.) and Live Mulch refers to methods of symbiotic intercropping and mixed cropping.

In this, farmers develop multiple cropping patterns of monocotyledons (with one seed leaf) and dicotyledons (with two seed leaves) grown in the same field. For instance, legumes which belong to the dicot group are nitrogen-fixing in nature. Inversely, monocots like rice and wheat are rich in potash, phosphate and sulphur.

Thumu’s nature farm intercrops drumstick and Malabar neem (a softwood variety) in their mango orchard.

After using many of these methods, the farm has not only been able to become a sustainable venture but over the last few years, has also started making profits.

What makes Thumu’s Mango Orchard better than its counterparts are the 100 per cent naturally-grown and ripened mangoes ranging from Banginapalli Benishan, Dasheri, Himayat, Alphanso to Cheruku Rasalu, among others

Satwick highlights some of the practices they follow saying, “Our plants have never come in contact with chemicals, not even once, since they were planted. We practice good post-harvesting practices, we harvest fruits with its stalk and place it in crates. Therefore, our fruits never come in contact with the ground or have sap burns as each of them is desapped. Every single fruit is washed with lukewarm water after desapping. Our packing is done in strong boxes with hay cushioning.”

The deliveries are done in corrugated cardboard boxes with each box lined with mangoes that are 20 per cent ready to eat, 40 per cent to ripen in 3-4 days, and remaining to ripen in 6-8 days. Once delivered, they are fresh under room temperature for two to three weeks, and four to five weeks under refrigerated conditions.

The orders for these can be placed through their Facebook page and their WhatsApp number. The first point of contact for the customer is Satwick, who notes down the quantity and location to be delivered. He then relays the details to Srikanth. Once packed, these are delivered via cars from the farm to the doorsteps of the customers.

“Thanks for giving us the best tasting mangoes we had in recent years. We ordered Mangoes from Thumu’s nature farms but as mangoes were all over the place, we went ahead and bought mangoes from the market. Many of them went bad and were tasteless. I was so disappointed and then finally mangoes came from Thumu’s nature farms. They were worth every penny! There was a combination of varieties and ripe and unripe mangoes. This gave continuous fruit supply every day,” writes Sheeba Dheeraj, one of their Hyderabadi patrons.

Once the mango season ends mid-June, the team gets busy for the next three weeks with the maintenance of the orchard. All of their trees including mangoes, drumstick and Malabar neem undergo pruning. This refers to tilling between rows of trees to break down the pruned branches, which will later help in fertilising plants.

Once the season ends, some portion of the orchard is also used to grow seasonal vegetables for self-consumption.

Apart from mangoes and drumsticks, they also cultivate naturally-grown Sona Masoori Brown (only dehusked) and White (single polished) rice. Unlike their mangoes, the cultivated paddy is sold to individuals, across India.

One of the most loved paddy varieties is the indigenous Navara Rice.

“The currently available rice in the market are scientifically-modified varieties, which have less dietary fibre, iron and other micronutrients, and have a higher proportion of carbohydrates. Many of these market varieties are produced using chemicals and pesticides, which get retained in rice grains and slowly enter our body after consumption. In native seed varieties like Navara, yields are low. But not only is it highly nutritious and tastier but also possesses 8 per cent dietary fibre in comparison with 0.2 per cent in conventional white rice. Besides, Navara rice is also considered beneficial for those suffering from diabetes, anaemia, joint pains and also pregnant and lactating mothers,” adds Satwick.

The farm boasts of nine local cows. But given its lush green space and diverse nature, many peacocks, rabbits and birds have made it their home too.

Shedding light on the profits of the farm, Satwick adds, “A significant portion of everything we earn is reinvested back into the business because we want to extend our service and reach. This year we plan to plant custard apple, and also would like to offer ghee and honey to our consumers soon.”

Why is natural farming the need of the hour, I ask 54-year-old Srilatha.

“Today we hear about diseases that people are suffering which were never heard of when we were growing up. And it is rightly said, we are what we eat. If the food we grow is poisoned then, naturally, it is going to enter our bodies and harm us. Only natural farming can help us safeguard the health of our children and the generations to come. Besides, the very feeling of people walking into our farm, watching how the food they eat is grown and giving us amazing feedback is amazing,” she signs off.

If this story inspired you, know more about Thumu’s nature farms on their Facebook page here.

Also Read: Taking Up Organic Farming at 13, Kerala Student Now Grows 50+ Fruits & Veggies!

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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Avanee Jain calls herself an ‘accidental farmprenuer.’ “As a young girl, I would make innumerable trips to my grandfather’s farm in. I had no idea that these would materialise to something, years later,” Avanee tells The Better India.

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Founded in 2009, her company ‘Upaj’ runs a farm in the city where vegetables are grown without any chemicals and pesticides. In addition to that, the enterprise also sells ‘Grow-it-yourself (GIY)’ kits to make farming a part of an urban lifestyle.
The kit comprises a biodegradable pot made of coconut, seeds, organic fertiliser, planting tag, instruction manual. All a person has to do is water the kit and see the vegetables grow.

Born and raised in Vadodara, Gujarat, Avanee completed her B.Arch in 2000 and worked in the industry for the next couple of years. Following that, she decided to quit and concentrate on raising her children.

When her children became old enough, Avanee decided to take her love for gardening seriously and started growing vegetables on the 50,000 sq ft plot owned by her family.

“I combined the farming knowledge I had from my grandfather, with some online research, and started growing seasonal vegetables. I had used chemicals and pesticides in the first cycle, and the extent of deterioration in nutrients of the plants was clear. That is when I realised that I did not want those chemically grown veggies on my dinner table,” says the 41-year-old.

Starting the Organic Journey

Just when the first crop cycle was about to end, Avanee started looking for safer alternatives and decided to educate herself on organic farming through YouTube videos and online research. She also enrolled herself in a long-distance course on permaculture at Cornell University to enhance her knowledge in farming techniques.

“I replaced chemicals with biomass⁠—fallen leaves, leftover vegetable waste and wet waste. Not only does this keep the insects away, but it also helps in retaining the water. I also use the biomass for mulching or covering the soil. The thick layer prevents weed growth and burning of root hair during summers,” she explains.

She opted for multi-cropping, a technique where more than two crops are planted together, to save water and increase the yield output. For example, she planted the seeds of tomato and basil. Another combination was marigold and root vegetables like radish. Avanee did not flatten her field. Instead, she raised some parts of the ground to prevent water runoff.

“We dug up trenches and filled up the soil in the center to make a raised bed. The trenches help in draining off excess rainwater from the raised bed, keeping the crop dry. The trenches also help in storing this essential water and helping in hydrating the land.”

After keeping aside some of the produce for her family, Avanee distributed the remaining to her friends and relatives. Thanks to word-of-mouth, the demand for her vegetables started increasing, so she started farming on different plots of land which were owned by her friends and relatives, and eventually started selling vegetables from her relative’s house.

She also employed women from an underprivileged background to manage farming activities, and today, her team consists of 10 people. To procure seeds for her farm, Avanee tied up with three groups of farmers from nearby villages.

Spreading Her Expertise

Once Avanee got used to farming, she started inviting people, farmers and school students for visits and workshops on organic farming.

“There were people like me who wanted to farm and had a vacant plot of land, but no idea how to go about it. So, I came up with the idea of workshops. These workshops vary from one month to one year.”

In the workshop, she lends a piece of her land to the client and lets them cultivate fruits and vegetables. From using organic fertilisers, water-saving techniques in farms to planting multiple crops together for a faster produce, Avanee imparts all the necessary knowledge through the workshops. The clients are also given seeds and organic fertilisers.

So far, Upaj has conducted over 400 workshops on different subjects relating to Urban farming and gardening at home.

Shivani from Nandesari enrolled for Avanee’s workshop in 2017. She is an HRD Director and a mother of two. After the workshop, she procured organic seeds from Avanee and started growing her own vegetables. She distributes the organic produce to her friends, relatives and workers in her company.

Wondering how to grow your own vegetables at home? Look no further! Check out different kits by Upaj Farms here.

“I was always interested in gardening, and the workshop was beneficial. The taste and quality of the food on my farm is so much better than what is available in the market. After we set up the farm, even my children help in farming activity,” Shivani tells The Better India.

Soon, people started asking for seeds so that they could grow veggies in their house. That is when Avanee came up with the idea of the GIY kit.

“People are increasingly leaning towards natural food, but it is expensive, and not everyone can afford it. Also, for people living in the cities, space is a huge challenge, so it is not feasible to maintain a full-time farm. This kit is a one-stop solution,” says Avanee.

Avanee is now working towards designing a kit exclusively for children. Besides the pot and seeds, the kit will also have a tiny information booklet explaining the farming method, recipes of the vegetables, its benefits, and so on.

You can get in touch with Upaj here.

Wondering how to grow your own vegetables at home? Look no further! Check out different kits by Upaj Farms here.

(Edited by Gayatri Mishra)

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A silent but new revolution is taking place in the agricultural sector. In prehistoric days, especially in the Neolithic age, human beings started farming. Later, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, they started the multicrop farming and farm breeding.

Now, it is the time of Vertical or V-farming.

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In simple terms, V-farming is a method to produce leafy veggies (spinach, amaranthus, mint, lettuce, kale, basil) and some non-tree fruits (tomatoes, brinjal, strawberries) where there is nearly no available arable land; these are grown in vertically stacked layers made of PVC pipes resembling a multi-storied building of plants. The plants are grown in a controlled environment under artificial lighting using LED bulbs, either in a building and polyhouse on rooftops or open land.

V-farming can be either aeroponics (growing plants in air or mist without the use of soil or an aggregate medium) or hydroponics (growing plants using mineral nutrient solutions in water solvent without soil).

Though there is no exact data on how many V-farms are there in India or in the world, what farmers know is that it is a very high productive farming, with nearly 70-80 per cent more harvest per unit of area. If one has a 1000 sq ft plot of land, vertical farming on it yields a harvest which is equivalent to 3,000-4,000 sq ft of plot. Moreover, with a crop cycle of 3-4 times a year, the profits are substantial as compared to traditional farming.

25-year-old Vihari Kanukolla of Urban Kisaan adds, “Soil-less V-farms help grow pesticide-free vegetables using 95 per cent less water than traditional farming. And that too, in a clean and hygienic environment. A user can be assured of consuming quality vegetables.”

Urban Kisaan was founded by Dr Sairam, Srinivas Chaganti and Vihari Kanukolla in Hyderabad in 2017. Srinivas Chaganti says, “The best part of V-farming is that you can have year-round production. It can be urban-centric, thereby cutting down on the cost of transportation and retaining the freshness of the produce. The crop has the added advantage of reduced susceptibility to weather extremes.”

Then there are brothers Benjamin and Brian Zehr who started a hydroponics farm, Kisano, in Mumbai last year. They feel, “V-farming is the way to reduce carbon footprints. We need this type of farming to feed the next billion people without destroying our planet.”

They claim that there is lesser usage of water and absolutely no chemical fertiliser or pesticides; if need be, only neem leaf extract is sprinkled.

Elaborating the advantages, the marketing head of Suregrow, K R Karthikeyan says, “Leafy vegetables start losing their nutrients within 8-10 hours of harvesting. They aren’t like apples, which can be transported from Himachal Pradesh to Kanyakumari. So if you lose a day in transporting, by the time they come to your dining table, they are just green without much nutrient value left in them. With V-farms being in cities or on close outskirts, a consumer can be assured of getting real farm-fresh veggies.” Suregrow is the vertical farming brand of Coimbatore-based Pennysworth Techno Farms P(Ltd).

Innumerable other V-farmers are mushrooming not only in India but also in the world. AeroFarms is one of the biggest Vertical farms in Newark in New Jersey, spread over a 69,000 sq foot warehouse. Japan’s Mirai V-farms operates from 12 locations including a 25,000 sq ft farm, with a capacity of harvesting 10,000 lettuce heads a day. The next biggest V-farm is coming up in Dubai in January 2020, on a 1,30,000 sq ft area to produce 6,000 pounds (nearly 2,772 kg) of green veggies per day.

“We are growing nearly 320 bunches of Indian greens in a 260 sq ft V-farm via hydroponics, and we can have 20 such harvests in a year. One can get nearly 15,000 kg of red and yellow capsicum in a 10,000 sq ft area in a single harvest. We can have three such harvests in two years,” explains Prof C V Nagendhiran, the founder of Suregrow.

Explaining the popularity of the produce from V-farming, K Latha, assistant director of horticulture at the Telangana State Centre of Excellence (TSCoE) in Jeedimetla, says, “People have become aware of the importance of safe food. This kind of farming, especially if it is done on rooftops, backyards, or small open land in neighbourhoods, will ensure quality veggies, saving food miles. But a lot of research needs to be undertaken to make it viable. At present, there isn’t much.”

She adds that although one can get a good yield, proper marketing outlets are required. About two years ago, the TSCoE had started cultivating broccoli, but as there weren’t many takers, they had to abandon that project.

Vihari of Urban Kissan and Karthikeyan of Suregrow agree on the necessity of a marketing strategy. “One should tie-up with local supermarkets where there are outlets for quality veggies or with good eating joints where they use farm-fresh veggies.”

The upcoming Dubai V-farm has already tied up with the Dubai Airport, along with international flights which have a significant daily demand for greens.

It may take a few decades for it to run parallel with traditional horizontal land farming, which is at least a thousand years old. But the speed at which we are losing land to the world of constructions, changing villages into small towns and with population explosion (7.7 billion at the last count by the United Nations’ Worldometers), we will soon run short of land to grow food to meet the demands of an increasing number of mouths.

“V-farming or Urban farming, which includes hydroponics and aeroponics, can never take over traditional farming. It can’t substitute for tree produce or cereals like rice, wheat and dals. But this is the future for shrubs and herbs,” opines Prof Nagendhiran.

And there are some minus points also. Initial investment costs lakhs of rupees which is unaffordable for ordinary farmers anywhere in the world. Abroad, many of these farms being supported by financial companies; for instance, the Dubai V-farm is being supported by Emirates Flight Catering and Crop One Holdings. It began with USD 40 million and raised USD 100 million, which will go towards R&D and technology.

Many V-farms opt for venture funding. In India, however, no financier has come forward to finance them. If a person applies for farm loan for V-farming, it might not be sanctioned because there has to be a piece of land for a farm loan. But they could apply for a loan a business venture to sell farm produce.

Vijay Yelmalle of Kharghar, Maharashtra, of CRAFT (Center for Research in Alternative Farming Technology) trains urbanites in hydroponics; he travels across rural regions, teaching farmers about its advantages. He says, “Banks do sanction loans if the farmer presents V-farming as a business venture. At present, V-farming is a business as most of the players are from the corporate world.”

Another minus point is that supporters of V-farm claim to reduce carbon footprints. But as the veggies grow in artificial lights, the consumption of power is great. Even though they use LED bulbs, 24-hour consumption of power amounts to a lot. The Dubai V-farms says they aim to use a mix of power grid energy and solar power.

For this, one has to know the perfect technique. Entire crops can fail with a slight change in the pH level of the solvent or because of a slight variation in temperature. It needs constant monitoring. One has to learn it thoroughly before venturing into it. Most practitioners like Urban Kisaan, Suregrow, Kisano, CRAFT and TSCoE offer intense training services.

Suregrow has helped set up V-farms almost all over India except in Punjab and Kashmir; it offers three-step training. “We offer information, training and hand-holding for a year to guide our clients to become experts in whatever veggies they want to grow. We even teach them to install the V-farm at a minimum investment. In the next five years, all over the world, vegetable farming techniques will change. We need to keep abreast,” concludes Prof Nagendhiran.

Also Read: Ex-Navy Commander Trains 10,000+ People To Grow Their Own Food Through Hydroponics!

So when multistory buildings were invented during Greek and Roman cities (Roman insulae) to provide cheap residences, they may not have realised that they were laying the foundation for future techniques for vertical farms. But looking at the fast burgeoning populations, vertical farms may just become the norm for a majority of vegetable production by 2050.

(Edited by Shruti Singhal)

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When IIT-Madras alumnus, Suryakumar Boriah moved back to India in the late eighties after working in the United States in the field of engineering, he wanted to work for a cause that he felt passionate about. He started exploring alternative career options and decided to give shrimp farming a chance.

“My family has been farming for decades now and an integral part of my upbringing. But I did not want to grow vegetables and fruits, so I decided to explore shrimp farming and today, it has been 30 years since I have been doing shrimp cultivation,” Boriah tells The Better India.

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Boriah’s 100-acre eco-friendly shrimp farm is located in Tamil Nadu’s Mahendrapalli village. This one-of-its-kind farm is a successful example of disease resistant, eco-friendly shrimp farming employing the biofloc technology (BFT) known to increase the output twofold naturally, keep insects at bay and has zero-water exchange.

No wonder this farm is a source of learning for the farmers in the village and researchers across India!

Boriah learnt the BFT from professor Yoram Avnimelech of Technion, an author and professor at the Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa.

Interestingly, Avnimelech studied the farm techniques Boriah used and even wrote about it in one of his papers on cultivating shrimp in small ponds.

Understanding The Problem

Shrimp farmers use a lot of chemicals and culture during shrimp farming which is susceptible to diseases like the White Spot Virus. While the chemicals do help in preventing the disease outbreak, they can end up in the shrimp, putting consumers at risk.

Another challenge that comes with shrimp farming is the artificial feed given to the shrimps to ensure high-density farming.

“When the proportion of feed is high, the shrimp waste discharged in the pond is also high. And the excess feed contain high amount of proteins that eventually breakdown into ammonia, which is the biggest challenge in aquafarming,” the 66-year-old explains.

With excess waste and feed in the ponds, an effective waste-treatment facility is necessary considering that farmers have to flush out the pond water once every month. If the water in unfiltered, it can pollute the water body it is being discharged into or even pollute the neighbouring farming lands.

Facing the Problem

Boriah started his company Hitide Seafarms in 1989 to cultivate shrimps. He used the traditional method of pumping water from estuary to exchange pond water but the estuary’s water quality and level is usually affected by scanty rainfall.

While he continued battling with minor problems, his practice was severely hit during 1996-97 when the farm was attacked by the White Spot Syndrome Virus, a viral infection affecting penaeid shrimp.

To counter this, he started interacting with experts in the field and fortunately, during a seminar in Kochi, he met Avnimelech who told him about BFT and also spent some time in Boriah’s village to guide him.

Addressing the Challenges

“The BFT enhances the water quality in aquaculture in a sustainable manner,” informs Boriah.

A biofloc looks like brown or green sludge which is an aggregate of uneaten feeds, shrimp waste and microorganisms such as bacteria, algae, fungi, invertebrates and detritus, etc. It uses photosynthesis to convert the waste into nutritious food.

Boriah uses heterotrophic bacteria as a major component in the open pond. Heterotrophic bacteria multiplies upon consuming ammonia.

Boriah also adds molasses in the pond to increase bacterial growth. The bacteria, in turn, becomes protein that can be fed to the shrimps.

When the population of bacteria is high, they combine together to become floc which also naturally filters the gills of the fish.

To protect the shrimp from diseases, Boriah has laid High-density polyethylene (HDPE) sheets in the pond. The most important element in BFT is the aeration or oxygen that has to be supplied constantly. For the same, Boriah has installed an aerator.

“On the one hand the heterotrophic bacteria needs oxygen for life processes and on the other hand, solids in the pond reduce the ability of the water to hold oxygen. In such a scenario, oxygen must be added through aeration process. One has to ensure 100 per cent power back up otherwise the entire exercise can fail,” he adds.

The Result

The production per unit at Boriah’s farm is approximately four times higher than conventional cultivation. “Presently, the biofloc pond gives up to 20 tonnes of shrimp per hectare as against five tonnes,” Boriah shares.

As for the investment cost, one requires an investment of Rs 30 lakh per hectare to set up an eco-friendly shrimp farm.

“Aerators, bacteria and a reliable team of 75 people are behind the success of sustainable shrimp farming,” says Boriah.

The shrimp farmer highly recommends sustainable farming that will not only give higher profits and yield but also work in harmony with nature.

“You just have to follow the rules of the land by using natural inputs and avoid pesticides or antibiotics. Lastly, ensure that waste water is not dumped in the river,” he signs off.

Also Read: 74-YO Ex-IPS Officer Turns Organic Farmer, Grows Paddy & Shrimp in Kerala!

Picture Courtesy: Suryakumar Boriah

(Edited by Saiqua Sultan)

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