Karimnagar :

At a time when the farming community is in dire straits over the drought conditions, here is a progressive farmer who is reaping dividends by making the most of organic farming methods.

Meet the forty-four year Guda Narsimha Reddy of Katukur village in Bheemdeverapalli mandal, whose success mantra in getting a good yield in his mango crop is simple – use cow urine, dung and organic fertilisers.

Narsimha Reddy rears Gir cows brought from Gujarat in his orchard. He collects the cow urine in a storage tank and through drip irrigation and supplies the same to the mango trees as a substitute for water. For the specific purpose of storing cow urine, he constructed a 450-liter sump at his cow shed in the mango orchard. And he uses the cow dung too for farming. He burns the dried dung cakes under the mango trees once a month to kill pests.

Setting aside traditional farming, he adopted new methods like drip irrigation, organic cultivation and pruning the trees after plucking mangoes. Since last five years, he is cultivating mango crop in 10 acres and has raised about 500 mango trees. With his systematic water management and usage of organic fertilisers, he has become an inspiration to other farmers.

Surprisingly, other farmers in the village are also having mango orchards but they are not exceeding three tonnes per acre of produce, in view of the prevailing dry spell. However, Reddy has overcome such hurdles and succeeded in raising a robust crop of Banganapalli variety and exports it to Delhi and Nagpur every year.

Speaking to Express, Narsimha Reddy said presently his crop yield is 10 tonnes per acre, and he plans to increase it to 15 tonnes. This year, he claims to have spent just Rs.1 lakh for crop cultivation, and earned returns over Rs.18 lakh.

Katukur village is an upland area with no water sources, except for borewells that have to be dug hundreds of feet. Though he had finished graduation, since childhood, he had a passion for cultivation.

source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> States> Telangana / by Naveen Kumar Tallam / April 08th, 2016