THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A piece of marshy land at Muttada in Thiruvananthapuram belonging to a private builder, which was otherwise being used to dump construction waste, has been converted into a lush vegetable farmland. This has been done with the technical support of the State Agricultural Development and Farmers Welfare Department. And the vegetables harvested are now being exported to West Asia after the local demands are met.
Modern agricultural practices like precision farming have been introduced in the land. The mulching method, by which a protective organic or inorganic layer of material is spread on the ground, to grow vegetables. It has been adopted to avoid the plants from getting rotten due to rain, drought and heat. Though precision farming was introduced several years ago, this technology- and information-based method of farming has started being adopted by urban farmers only recently. In the eco-living farming land at Muttada, the concept being implemented by the people behind it is “farm to home”. The hi-tech farming practices use less manpower, mainly to pluck the vegetables for sale and to clear the area of weeds.
“Through drip irrigation, the required nanomanure is pumped in. Only organic matter is used. For one litre of water, only two grams of nanomanure is required. In normal circumstances, 100 grams of manure costs `500. Due to the mulching method adopted, the advantage is that it will withstand the flooding caused due to rain. This is the same technology used in polyhouse farming,” a senior agriculture department official told TNIE.
Over the last one month, a stream of local residents have been coming to the farmland at Anchumukku at Muttada from 9am to get fresh organic vegetables. Currently, the vegetables produced include salad cucumber, long beans, tomatoes, bitter gourd, long gourd, ladies finger, white melon, red amaranthus, green chilli, pumpkin etc. In another five months, several varieties of fish like mrigal carp, rohu, catla and chitralada will be ready for harvesting.