Pulse based bio-village sustainable models through participatory demonstrations for livelihood security

A study to evaluate on sustainability of bio-village through farmers’ participation in pulses was carried out at two villages namely, Barapur in Shahjahanpur district and Kucharam in Chitrakoot district in Uttar Pradesh, India. This study was based on a Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Government of India funded project on “Development of pulses based bio-village sustainable models through action research for livelihood security under different agroecosystems in Uttar Pradesh”. The project was implemented in collaboration with two Krishi Vigyan Kendras located at the respective district of Chitrakoot and Shahjahanpur. The programmes were selected for action research with demonstrations and seed production of kharif and rabi pulses among 70 farmers. Farmers were also facilitated with field level trainings and meetings. The crops were managed with pesticides for control of pod borer in chickpea. Demonstrations on improved urdbean and mungbean varieties showed higher crop performance (853 kg/ha and 883kg/ha, respectively) in Shahjahanpur district. In addition, still higher yields were recorded in Chitrakoot district in both these crops (urdbean with 1120 kg and mungbean with 1133 kg per hectare). Further, the performance of chickpea varieties was reverse at both these districts (JG 14 and JG 16 with 1450 and 1500 kg/ha, respectively at Shahjahanpur while the corresponding figures at Chitrakoot were 1418 and 1337 kg/ha, respectively). Thus, promotion of mungbean & urdbean in Chitrakoot while that of chickpea in Shahjahanpur could be made as it was associated with ecology of the region. Besides crop performance, a total 2768 kg quality seed of chickpea ‘Ujjawal’ was distributed to 21 farmers under seed hub programme to enable the farmers self-sufficient in seed production. A rapidly multiplying earthworm ‘Eisenia foetida’ was also given to farmers for improvising vermi-composting through construction of 34 vermi-compost structures (of size 10x3x2 ft) which generated great deal of interest and awareness among the farmers for promotion of organic agriculture in pulses. Besides these, the waste decomposer developed by National Bio-fertilizer Development Center was also demonstrated to 40 farmers for production of biofertilizers. Two IIPR mini dal mills were also demonstrated and supplied for value addition and employment creation through pulses. The implementation of the project was an eye opener to other farmers in the neighborhoods to follow and adopt.