Green fodder in 7 days

Now, produce green fodder sans soil in 7 days

(Times of India) Farmers paying high costs for cattle feed have some good news to chew on.

They can produce green fodder in an electronic machine without soil in just seven days. A hydroponics green fodder production unit, which can produce it faster than conventional method, was inaugurated at ICAR research complex, Old Goa, by A K Singh, deputy director general, ICAR, New Delhi on Sunday. "The seed has to be placed on a tray filled with water and kept in a machine under the right temperature, light and humidity," said N P Singh, director ICAR, Old Goa.

The conventional method takes 30 to 45 days, but the machine delivers it faster. "A 1.5 kg of maize seed can produce about seven to nine kg of fodder and its height grows to 20 to 25 cms," Singh said.

The state agriculture department has entrusted the scheme to Goa state cooperative milk producers' union limited for implementation. "The project worth Rs 2.20 crore is being taken up under the central government's Rakshtriya krishi vikas yojana (RKVY)," S Tendulkar, agriculture department director said.

The Goa dairy will purchase 11 electronic machines on a pilot project basis and install them in high milk producing areas.

"Each unit costing 25 lakh will be put at the farmers' service in areas with high concentration of dairy farmers," Madhav Sahakari, Goa dairy chairman said.

Goa has just around 8,000 dairy farmers as their number has declined due to higher production costs and other factors. "The milk production is around 50,000 litres per day," Sahakari said.

But the bulk of the requirement is procured from outside the state.

Though the animal husbandry and veterinary services department provides an attractive subsidy scheme to dairy farmers, the quantum of green fodder grown in the state is negligible," sources said.

"The dry concentrated feed is costly and farmers are facing problems in coping with production costs," Sahakari said. The machine produced fodder will also have higher protein content.

The use of hydroponic technology will also help reduce labour costs drastically.

"A single person can operate the electronic machine," Sahakari said. The farmers can place their trays in the unit and collect the fodder after a week. A specially formulated, energy-rich, feed supplement called 'bypass fat', prepared by ICAR from farm oil fatty seed for cattle was also released on Sunday.

"The simple, pro-small farmer indigenous technology for preparing the bypass fat is specially meant for the high-producing dairy animals," said P K Naik, ICAR senior scientist.

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