World pulses day at RARS, Warangal on 10-02-2022

All India Coordinated Research Project on Pigeonpea and District Agricultural Advisory and Transfer of Technology Centre (DAATTC), Regional Agricultural Research Station, Warangal (RARS) have organized a farmer training programme on the eve of “World pulses day” on 10-02-2022 at Conference room, RARS, Warangal. The programme was started with playing of University song. Dr. R. Uma Reddy, ADR, Central Telangana Zone addressed the gathering about the importance of pulses, importance of pulse in every day’s diet, scope of pulses area expansion and importance of celebration of world pulse day. Advised famers to cultivate short duration pulse crops in rice follows in Yasangi. Further emphasized on pulse crops cultivation, as they has environmental and socioeconomic benefits, performs well in conservation systems, intercropping systems and also fixes the atmospheric nitrogen, releases high-quality organic matter in the soil and facilitates soil nutrients readily available to the crop plants, water retention etc. Dr. Balram Marati, Associate Dean, Agriculture College, Warangal attended as chief guest and apprised the farmers about possible reasons for productivity gap of pulses in India viz., lack of proper awareness on newly released high yield varieties, cultivating traditional or conventional varieties, cultivating pulses for the personal use only etc. Dr. N. Sandhya Kisore, Head & Scientist (Breeding), Pulses Section, RARS, Warangal delivered a power point lecture about the pulse area statistics, production, productivity and increasing trend of pulses in Telangana and India, water footprint of pulses with respect to protein source, for instance the water footprints to produce a kilogram of beef, pork, chicken and soybeans are 43, 18, 11 and 5 times higher than the water footprint of pulses, cropping system of pulses, per capita consumption and per capita requirement of pulses in Telangana, MSP of pulses crop, % share of different crops and their extent in Telangana and India, threshold temperature for pulses during Yasangi, role of pulses in crop diversification in rice fallows, raised bed, ridge and follow method of planting of pulse crops, newly released varieties in Redgram, Greengram and machine harvestable Bengalgram varieties, complete package of practice of pulse crop etc. Dr. CH. Damodar Raju, Principal Scientist (Breeding) discussed on importance of pulses in rice fallows, % of increasing pulses area in Telangana etc. Dr. E. Narsaiah, Coordinator, DAATTC, Warangal interacted with farmers on pulses cultivation and their benefits. Shri. Shiva kumar, C/o Venkata Sai Dal Processing Mill attended as guest and shared his experience in Dal Processing and Marketing. Later in the programme, nine (9) pulses growing progressive farmers were felicitated and further shared their experience with other farmers.