Shri Gowhar Ahmad Ganie,28, is a marginal farmer of village Bogund, situated at about 2 Kms from Kulgam in the south Kashmir. Total cultivable land available with the family is only 0.35 ha. They used to grow conventional crops like rice in kharif and brown sarson in rabi season. The low monetary returns prompted Gowhar along with his elder brother Tariq Ahmad to search options for meeting out this challenge.
Gowhar used to attend trainings/awareness camps and interactions with the scientists of Krishi Vigyan Kendra-Kulgam. This helped him develop interest in diversification of farming. The enthusiasm of the family including younger brothers and the women members opened new avenues for remunerative farming with technical backstopping on poultry, fishery, horticulture and floriculture from KVK, Kulgam. Guidance about different schemes and supply of critical farm inputs helped him in undertaking integrated farming on scientific lines. He established a fish pond over an area of 0.1 ha for which fisheries department helped him. Looking his interest and dedication, SKUAST-Kashmir provided him poultry birds. Due to huge demand of Vanaraja and Kurolier, he also approached Poultry Development Department for supply of more birds. Besides, Department of Agriculture and Department of Horticulture supported him with two polyhouses and other inputs for off-season vegetable cultivation and raising of seedlings for early supply in the market. Floriculture officer of Kulgam has recently allotted four poly houses for raising pot flowers and ornamental plants. KVK also supported him in the marketing of the material produced by him. He has also started growing lawn grasses and ornamental plants on a large scale, which have great demand in the area.
The Impact
The annual family income of the farmer was hovering around Rs 23,000/- earlier, which improved exponentially with the integration of poultry, fishery, floriculture and agriculture and reached to the tune of Rs 2.77 lakh in the year 2013. There is no looking back and now his family income has increased to 1.6 lakh per month i.e. 19 lakhs/year. The contribution from different components in terms of net profit per annum is Rs. 1.36 lakh from fishery, Rs. 7.24 lakh from poultry, Rs. 1.52 lakh from sale of pot flowers, vegetable and flower seedlings and Rs.9.0 lakhs from landscaping business.
Impressed with the progress of farmer, the KVK has decided to invite him as a Mentor Trainer for imparting training to rural youth. He has been instrumental in facilitating exposure visit of farmers to his farm and he is famous as ‘Role Model’ among his fellow farmers.
(Source: ICAR Agricultural Technology Application Research Institute, Ludhiana)
Like on Facebook
Subscribe on Youtube
Follow on X X
Like on instagram