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“The agricultural practices were different in earlier days compared to the present practices” - says Smt. Muniyamma of Devaramaradaggu, Saraswathinagar Cluster. Since 15 years she has been practicing agriculture through chemical farming and recently found decrease in yield. After observing the condition of her land, she started attending village meetings conducted by GREEN foundation in Saraswathinagar. The awareness on organic farming practices and importance of traditional varieties given by the field managers of GREEN Foundation, made her to divert her land towards organic farming. She initiated her work in organic farming by taking banana crop. She transplanted the banana saplings in 0.5 acres of land at a spacing of 4 feet X 4 feet using Farm Yard Manure (FYM) and low cost vermicompost. After a month she applied Jeevamrutha as growth promoter and neem cakes as pesticidal agent. Since there was shortage of Jeevamrutha, she could not apply to some plots. There is great difference in crop observation by application of Jeevamrutha. The crop is now 9 month old with finger in initial stage. After comparing her plot with the neighboring plot grown with the same banana crop under chemical farming, she now finds her plot to be very healthy and green. While the neighboring plot under chemical farming showed stunted growth and pale leaves. The other observations include smaller stem girth and less number of fingers in the bunch. Observing the benefits of organic farming, she has now decided to divert her entire agricultural area under organic farming. |
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