THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: ‘‘Chia?’’ Agriculture Minister V S Sunil Kumar picks up a small packet of tiny seeds. ‘’This is chia.’’
The Central American plant, whose grey-coloured seeds are considered an emerging ‘superfood’ across the world, is the latest entrant to the state’s farm sector.
The Agriculture Department, actively bringing back millets and cereals that had vanished from the state’s farms, has now started test-farming chia in a small way at Attappadi in Palakkad district.
Chia and Quinoa, another ‘pseudocereal’ like Chia cultivated in South America, are already being becoming popular among farmers in states like Karnataka.
“Chia is rich in protein content. We have started cultivating it on an experimental basis in a small area in Attappadi. If found successful, we plan to extend it to more areas,’’ Agriculture Minister V S Sunil Kumar says.
Cultivated by the Aztec and other Central American cultures in pre-Columbian times as a staple food, Chia is the edible oval seed of the mint-family plant Salvia hispanica and the related Salvia columbariae. It was in October 2017 that the Agriculture Department launched the ‘Millet Village’ scheme in Attappadi to promote the cultivation of cereals such as ragi (finger millet), thina (foxtail millet), cholam (sorghum) and kuthiravaali (barnyard millet).
In the first phase, the department had launched cultivation in 1,200 acres in 45 tribal villages. However, much of it failed to provide any yield, a disappointment Sunil Kumar attributes to the drought. “We got a yield from 140 acres.
By launching the millet project, we respected the demand of tribal communities that the department try and revive their food culture,’’ he says. On July 28, at a function planned in Attappadi, the department will also launch packed produce from this novel project, the Minister says.