Rice Traveling Seminar
Travelling seminar is an important activity of the
NCRP. During the seminar, activities like spot examination of the candidate rice
varieties, monitoring of insect pests and disease attack and assessment of
general crop conditions in the country are carried out. Besides these,
travelling seminar promotes inter-institutional linkages and is very helpful in
identifying, the important issues relating to rice crop and industry in the
country. Therefore, Rice Programme has organized a rice travelling seminar from
October 27 to November 1st 2007 in the rice growing areas of Punjab. A
multidisciplinary team of breeders, agronomists, entomologists, plant
pathologists, soil scientists and social scientists participated in the seminar.
In addition, representatives from private sector also participated in the
seminar to strengthen the public-private interaction. The concept of travelling
seminar is to get apprehension about the crop situation before harvest and get
direct in contact with farmers to know their problems of rice production, so
that the future strategies may be formulated to overcome of the issues.
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During the travelling seminar we have got an opportunity to interact with scientists, private seed companies, progressive and conventional farmers and also to monitor the rice crop in the fields directly. Based on detailed discussion and direct-field visits, following observations seem important to be inked here. Overall, it was a good year for rice crop. Almost all farmers were happy with rice yield and prevailing prices of paddy. However, attack of BLB was observed in majority of the areas visited and was seen as a major threat in future and 10-15% (5-10 maunds/ acre) yield loss may be expected in various regions of central and ‘Kallar’ tract of Punjab during 2007. Despite, almost all farmers were happy with rice yield and prevailing prices of paddy.
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