Kanwar Lal paving the way for Smart Agriculture to the farmers

 

Kaalu Singh Shri Kanwar Lal (65 years) is one of the lead farmers from Narwal village of Agar Malwa, owning 22 bigha (around 13.5 acre) farmland, wherein he grows Wheat, Gram, Oranges, Garlic and Onion.

Kanwar Lal’s story is an epitome of Adaptability, Determination and Actionism. For past many years he had been practicing chemical intensive farming which involved use of high dose of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. This led to exponential rise in cost of cultivation by 60 to 70 % per acre, at the same time problems like poor crop yield, high pests’ infestation, crop diseases and losses due to climatic impact also occurred.

He experienced that despite of using fertilizer, the fertility of soil is depleting. Kanwar Lal was seeking a solution to mitigate risk and reduce cost. Kanwar Lal shared the issue with the front-line team of Solidaridad. The agony of Kanwar Lal started to diminished when he participated in training programme based on benefits of ecological agriculture practices organised by Solidaridad. He pursued the entire technical advice and set up a compost unit in his backyard which produced 10 quintal of good quality compost within 40 days of installation. He sprinkled the same on his wheat field and found a comparatively very good result in terms of plant height, plant density, leaf size, panicle length and grains per panicle.

Having realized the benefits, Kanwar Lal set up four additional units of Tetra pack of 10 quintal each on his own investment. He also shares that the Vermi-wash excreted from each of the unit is highly beneficial organic bio-pesticide with multiple benefits for the crops. It works both as a bio-pesticide, growth promoter and enzyme rich. He is able to generated 3 to 5 litres of Vermi-wash from each unit of compost bag on weekly basis. He has sprinkled it on the standing crop of wheat and Gram.

Moving a step ahead, he has also started selling of vermicompost to other farmers which has added an additional source of income. Currently he is supplying 16 to 20 quintals of vermicomposting to other farmers. He also envisions to try hands on other livelihood activities like use of cattle horn, dry fish, poultry manure, etc. He is thankful to the Solidaridad for bringing the knowledge and skills to his doorstep and helping him transform the way he does farming.