TRANSPLANTING IN RED GRAM

Red gram (Pigeonpea) is sometimes grown as a sole crop, but more typically, it is grown in relatively complex systems where it is intercropped, or mixed with other crops. Pigeonpea is generally broadcasted, but line sowing is superior over broadcasting. Broadcasting results in uneven plant population which ultimately results in low yield. In general transplanting of pigeonpea seedlings is one of the alternate agronomic practices to overcome late sowing and related lower yields of pigeonpea. This technique involves rising of seedlings in polythene bags in the nursery for one month and transplanting the seedlings with the onset of monsoon after the soil profile is uniformly wet.

This method uses lesser seed, chemical inputs and promotes soil biotic activities in and around plant roots, enhanced through liberal applications of compost and harrowing that aerates the soil. Further Transplanting at wider spacing allows enough sunlight to reach the leaves of each pigeonpea plant thus reducing competition for water, space and nutrients resulting in the spread of roots and healthy growth of plants. These changed practices with lower inputs counter-intuitively lead to improved productivity and yield. Filed experiments conducted to evaluate the performance of transplanted pigeonpea by few agricultural universities and NGOs elsewhere in the country have shown the encouraging results. But this method need to be tested in the local conditions and it need to gain momentum at large.

RATIONALE TO INCREASE RED GRAM PRODUCTION: Red gram is an important pulse crop in India, it is also known as Pigeonpea or Arhar or Tur. This crop is widely grown in India and India is the largest producer and consumer of Red gram in the world. But the  opening  up  of  economy  to  the  global  market  forces  has  changed  the framework  of  decision-making  for  farmers  in Andhra  Pradesh  as  elsewhere  in  the country,  particularly  in  regard  to  choice  of  crops.   Barring few, majority of the Indian farmers have been switching from food crops to cash crops especially cotton. Expectations  of  more  export opportunities  and  higher world  prices  for many  agricultural  commodities  led many farmers  to move  from  “secure”  subsistence  food  crops  to  high  risk/high  cost  cash crops for  the market. As  a result,  area  under  food  crops  has been in decline in  favour  of  cotton and other cash crops. 

This shift from food crops to cash crops resulted in to the significant decline in area under food grains especially pulses in favour of export crops. This shift resulted in the heavy burden on the farming community due to high input costs, environment pollution, deterioration in the soil organic carbon stocks and fertility of soil due to the extensive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides on cash crops and monoculture. The most important impact is decreased production of pulses.  Although the national situation on cereals remain encouraging; Pulses, Sugar and Edible Oils remain an area of concern.

The need of the hour is to bridge the gap between the demand and supply and address the need to encourage farmers to go in for more pulses production. To achieve this, consistent efforts should be made to improve local production by and revitalizing the soil health, providing incentives and seed subsidies to the farmers. As India is the largest consumer of red gram and it is a protein rich staple food. It contains about 22 percent protein and supplies a major share of protein requirement of vegetarian population of the country. Decreased area under red gram poses a significant threat to the food security. Hence India needs to invest on accelerating red gram production through the better seed supply management, capacity building of farmers on factors of production and promotion of improved package of practices, including technological interventions, and a region-specific approach are needed to alleviate the problem of short supply of pulses and chronic malnutrition among the people.