The well maintained farms of Horticulture department are a bliss for Chhattisgarh. They are turning out to be a boon for the farmers in the State, said Chief Secretary Vivek Dhand while visiting State’s first Seed Multiplication Centre (SMC) at Bana village near Raipur on Wednesday.Director, Horticulture Bhuvanesh Yadav and joint directors Bhupendra Pandey and R K Singh accompanied the Chief Secretary to Bana farm.
Assistant Director Horticulture (ADH) Bana Farm B P Parghania escorted the officers to plug type vegetable seedling production unit and other units installed in a stretch of over 75 acres in the farm.The officials viewed the process of seeds grown to seedling mechanically.Parghania informed that SMC Bana is providing farmers with seedlings in less time with lesser mortality, as it is difficult for farmers to prepare them with 100 per cent viability. The seedling so prepared is capable enough to grow at any environment.
He explained that the seedlings are grown and harden for a month. In the process of seed production, each seed is sown uniformly by plug type vegetable seedling production unit in a standardized depth and distance in tray.The seedling so grown is capable of adapting external environment thus results to lesser mortality. This process also saves time of the farmers of sowing seeds and waiting till it grows to a seedling. Around 2 crore hybrid seeds are being distributed to farmers per annum, Parghania informed the Chief Secretary.
The officials also visited the mist chambers, Polyhouse and saw the front line demonstration of Gerbera and Orchids.Meanwhile Yadav informed the Chief Secretary that considering the success of seed multiplication centre in Bana, one Plug Type Vegetable Seedling Production Unit is being established at Bilaspur with a total cost of Rs 6 crore that has a capacity of producing 1 crore seedling per annum.