TS-36, a toria variety likely to boost farmers’ income

সেউজী ধৰণী

TS-36, a toria variety likely to boost farmers’ income in Margherita Block of Tinsukia district

Dr.S.Hussain

Jagun is a small township of Tinsukia District bordering Arunachal Pradesh in the East and Nagaland in the South-East. People living in this part of the district belong to various cast, creed and community. However, all of them are predominantly farmers cultivating a number of field and horticultural crops. Being situated at the foot hill of Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh, land of Jagun area is very much fertile. River Dihing and a number of small streams encourage farmers to adopt agriculture as a profitable venture.

Sri Gopal Chetri is a progressive farmer of 3no Rampur village under Jagun Gaon Panchayat. He has a small piece of land measuring about 15 bighas where rice, maize, toria, summer and winter vegetables are grown. Toria is an important oil seed crop that farmers grow in Jagun. Sri Chetri has a sizable area under toria. However, the yield that he harvests with local as well as improved variety M-27 is not very encouraging. So, he was looking for a suitable toria variety to replace old varieties.

Sri Chetri was identified as probable beneficiary for demonstrating a new high yielding toria variety. Accordingly, Team ATMA, Tinsukia along with KVK scientist visited the site and approved it. The team also met other farmers of the village and enlightened them about ATMA and the objective of the demonstration to be conducted in the village. All the farmers showed keen interest on ATMA and the various programmes that are to be undertaken by it.

TS-36 is a new high yielding toria variety developed by Regional Agricultural Research Station (RARS), Shilongoni, Assam Agricultural University. The variety showed good performance in some other parts the district. Hence, it was decided to introduce TS-36 in Rampur village. By middle of October, 2012 seeds and other inputs were provided to the farmer. Seeds were sown in the first week of November. Soil moisture retained after tillage operation helps in uniform seed germination. As the season progress, field staff monitored the field activities frequently. Officers from the district HQ along with scientist from KVK, also visited the site and provided necessary guidance. For timely advice, contact number of KVK scientist was also provided to the farmer.

After three months of sowing, the crop was ready to harvest. During this period, the crop received two light showers. Field staff visited the site and decided to organize a Field Day at 3no Rampur villager. Accordingly, a Field Day was organized in the site on 9^th February, 2013 where about 60 farmers from four neighboring villages assembled. A joint field visit was made in the demonstration site where officers from district HQ and KVK also took part. All the farmers were happy with the crop stand, per plant pod number as well as pod size of TS-36.  Ceremonial harvesting was done in three plots, each measuring 5mx5m. It was observed that on an average 2.8 kg seed was recorded in 25 sqm plot which is equivalent to 150 kg per bigha or 11.2q per hectare. This yield was about 1.5 times more than the neighboring plot of M-27. Sri Gopal Chetry and fellow farmers expressed their satisfaction over the yield performance of TS-36. Sri Chetry spoke about the production technology that he had adopted. He was highly grateful to the team member of ATMA for all the help and guidance. The village head, who preside over the meeting, opined that for overall development of Rampur and other neighboring villages farmers had to adopt new technologies developed in the field of agriculture and allied sectors. He asked farmers to collect seed of TS-36 for the next crop season. Later, field staff reported that one liter oil could be extracted from 2.7 kg TS-36 seed while to get the same quantity of oil 3.2 kg M-27 seed was required.

Recent information received from the field staff indicated that more than 80 farmers will grow toria variety TS-36 during rabi 2013-14 in Jagun panchayat. Sri Gopal Chetry, with his knowledge and experience will act as resource person.

Per hectare additional income from Demonstration

Plot	As Seed			As Oil
	Yield Qt/ha	Value(Rs)	Addl Income(Rs/ha)	Oil extracted(lt)	Value(Rs)	Addl Income (Rs/ha)
Demo	11.2	56,000	26,120	414 lit	33,120	14,480
Control	7.47	29,880		233 lit	18,640

NB.1) Variety used: Control plot- M-27

                                 Demo plot - TS-36

       2) Cost as seed: Rs 50/ kg (TS-36) , Rs 40/kg ( M-27)

       3) Oil extracted: One lit from 3.2 kg of M-27 seed and 2.7 kg of TS-36 seed

       4) Price of Oil: Rs 80/ lit