Diseases and Management of Crops under Protected Cultivation

(Diseases and Management of Crops under Protected Cultivation)
Transfer of Protected Production Technology to Hill Farmers
M.P. Singh
Regional Research Station & KVK Lohaghat (Champawat), G.B.P.U&T. Pantnagar (UK )
Uttarakhand is primarily a mountainous state with about 10% of its total geographical area
in the plains. The state is having about 64.8%area under forests. The share of net sown area is
only 12%as against a national average of 43.37%.Out of the total 7, 66,730ha net sown area 2,
87,000ha is under horticultural crops. Agriculture is the main source of livelihood of majority of the
population of hilly areas of Uttarakhand. More than 71.42 % farmers are marginal farmers, and
having fragmented and scattered land holding less than 1 ha. Agriculture is largely traditional and
rain fed and farmers practicing ragi/rice-wheat, soybean-wheat cropping system. Although, great
developments has been taken place in field of agriculture during last few decades, farmers of hilly
areas of Uttarakhand are still following traditional farming which are not very remunerative.
Agriculture production is hardly sufficient to meet the domestic requirement for even a period of 4-
5 months. Majority of the farmers particularly in rural areas fall below the poverty line. They do not
have regular source of income to keep up their family. Therefore, there is great need of
diversification to enhance the income of poor farmers. The horticulture viz. fruit crops, vegetable
production and floriculture are one of the best ways of diversification in agriculture.
Uttarakhand is endowed with varied climatic conditions, which are suitable for the
production of various vegetables during off season in different areas around the year. The major
vegetables namely tomato, capsicum, cabbage, cauliflower, French bean, vegetable pea and
potato are being grown by the farmers. Total area under vegetable cultivation are 606507 ha with
productivity of 9.86 MT/ha. Which is very low as compare to Himachal Pradesh i.e. 17.5 MT/ha.
Table: 1 Area, production & productivity of major vegetable crops in Uttarakhand (2010-11)
S.
No.
Name of corps Area (ha) Production
(MT)
Productivity
(q/ha)
1 Tomato 8783 97077 110.53
2 Capsicum 2319 12738 54.92
3 Cabbage 5609 70461 125.62
4 Cauliflower 2550 33966 133.20
5 French bean 5176 38112 73.63
6 Veg. Pea 11187 86937 77.71
7 Brinjal 2228 25870 116.11
Source: Directorate of Horticulture and food processing Uttarakhand 2010-1
Major factor for low production of vegetables
Unavailability of quality seeds/planting materials and agrichemicals in hilly areas of
Uttarakhand are major constraints for production of vegetables. Drought, erratic behavior of rains,
hail-storm, frost and heavy snow fall in high hills is major a biotic factors which are responsible for
10-60% losses in vegetables production.
In view of the lucrative returns from vegetables framers with limited land for cultivation are
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