The Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), also known as the Pusa Institute, in collaboration with Jawaharlal Nehru Krishi Vishwa Vidyalaya (JNKVV) Jabalpur, Rajmata Vijayaraje Scindia Krishi Vishwa Vidyalaya, Gwalior and ICRISAT, Patancheru Hyderabad has developed ‘Pusa JG 16’, a drought-tolerant and high yielding variety of Chickpea. 

The Pusa JG 16 cultivar was created using genomic breeding methods by precisely introducing the drought tolerance gene from ICC 4958 into the parent cultivar J.G.16.  A countrywide experiment was done by the All India Collaborative Research Program on Chickpeas to verify the drought resistance of this variety. The variety has an ability to give the production of 2 tonnes per hectare under drought stress; also it is resistant to Fusarium wilt and stunting disease and has a quick maturation period (110 days).

Fusarium Wilt

The widespread plant disease Fusarium wilt is brought on by the fungus Fusarium oxysporum, which lives in the soil. Plant species including commercially significant food crops like sweet potatoes, tomatoes, beans, melons, banana (called as Panama wilt) and many other crops gets infected by this wilt. F. oxysporum may survive indefinitely in soil without contact with a living host plant and thrives at soil temperatures above 24 °C (75 °F).

Symptoms of Fusarium wilt

• Seedling, when infected, wilts and die. 
• Plants remain stunted, with leaves that progressively die and slide upward from the stem’s base after going from a pale green to a golden yellow colour. 
• Occurrence of black streaks on xylem vascular tissue of roots and lower stems leading to decaying of roots.  

Minister Anurag Singh Thakur inaugurated India’s first virtual e-learning platform for drone skills and training at the Chennai manufacturing facility of Indian drone-based startup Garuda Aerospace. It aims at the empowerment and mobilisation of Indian farmers across the nation using Agri-drone.

He also opened the first of 1000 Drone Centers of Excellence planned at Garuda Aerospace’s manufacturing division in Chennai and Garuda Aerospace’s Drone Yatra called “Operation 777”. According to an official publication, Yatra drones are designed to help farmers learn about the technology and better understand crop cultivation.

Garuda Aerospace is a Chennai-based drone technology start-up whose Kisan drone, equipped with sensors, cameras and atomizers, can increase food crop productivity, reduce crop losses and help farmers reduce harmful chemicals and helps reduce exposure to substances.

“No evidence that GM cotton cultivation is declining honey production”- stated by Dr. Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Science and Technology in reply to the question in the Rajya Sabha.

It has been observed in the studies conducted in 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 that Bt transgenic cotton varieties did not show any negative effect on bees, brooding, pollen and nectar from Apis mellifera colonies in comparison to non-transgenic cotton varieties. GM plants, which are developed by artificial modification of plant genes, generally involve adding genetic material from another organism, to give it new characteristics such as higher yield, herbicide tolerance, disease or drought or improved nutritional value.

GM COTTON

India has been cultivating Genetically modified (GM) cotton for twenty years. It contains genes of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) which is a bacteria. Thus, Bt helps in protecting cotton plants from bollworms  and hence reducing the usage of insecticide and increasing the yield of the cotton plant. 

GM MUSTARD

Dhara mustard Hybrid (DMH-11) (Transgenic variety) is a genetically modified variety of herbicide-tolerant (HT) mustard developed indigenously. It consists of two alien genes “barnase and bar star” which are isolated from Bacillus amyloliquefaciens, the soil bacterium. This bacterium helps in easier breeding of high-yielding commercial mustard hybrids.

Dharti Agro Chemicals launched 1st Genetic Male Sterility (GMS) based cowpea (Lobia) hybrids and three cowpea hybrids namely. 

1. Bubble
2. Sherly 
3. Poorvaja

They have given remarkable results to the farmers with 10 percent heterosis in the regular Kharif season and up to 20-25 percent heterosis in the off-season. This is almost double the profit in comparison to traditional varieties. 

Genetic Male Sterility (GMS) : 

Genetic Male Sterility is the result of a combination of mitochondrial genes with nuclear genes or by a combination of only nuclear genes. The conditions may lead to cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) and Genetic Male sterility (GMS). 

• Hybrid seeds are produced by using CMS and GMS for various crops thus enabling the breeders to take advantage of yield associated with heterosis (hybrid vigour).
• In CMS, male specificity, occurrence and fertility restoration are regulated by layers of interaction between mitochondrial and nuclear genes.
• Epigenetic control by non-coding RNAs may be caused due to Environment- sensitive GMS (EGMS) mutants. Also, they can revert to fertility depending on different growing conditions, and this is the reason why they are useful breeding materials for the hybrid seed industry. 

Why Cowpea? 

Cowpea is a rich source of protein and some trace elements. It has the ability to fix nitrogen and also helps in carbon sequestration and soil amelioration. This nature of cowpea helps in the reduction of the contribution of agriculture towards the volume of plant protection products usage which indirectly helps in improving and sustaining soil health. Cowpea hybrids are very suitable for off-season cultivation and are not sensitive to photoperiod. Heterosis breeding enhances the entire crop physiology by exploiting the sum of all beneficial genes and their interactions, resulting in higher yields, better disease resistance, wider adaptability, better fruit quality and more effective response to fertigation.

According to the information given by Shri Narendra Singh Tomar, the Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, in his written reply in the Rajya Sabha, resistant varieties of various crops to withstand climatic stress have been developed by ICAR. This measure has been taken to enhance the production of food grains even during the situations of climatic changes. In total 2122 cultivars have been released from 2014 till the date of which 1752 are climate-resilient varieties, 400 are abiotic stress-resistant cultivars and 1352 are biotic stress-resistant cultivars. For usage on a large scale in various agricultural communities 68 site-specific climate-resilient technologies were developed and popularised.

Over the past eight years, agricultural contingency plans have been developed for 650 districts and government officials have been made ready to stay prepared through 57 state-level interface meetings. These plans are available online to help policymakers in making decisions against late monsoons and other extreme weather events. Demonstration of Climate resilient technologies is done in rural fields in 151 clusters covering 446 villages based on vulnerability assessment. The negative effects of climate change on agricultural production have been effectively addressed through technological interventions. During the last 5 years, the production of food in the country has continuously increased as follows:

Development of varieties resistant to climate change is a boon for the agricultural workforce. 46.46 % of workforce is engaged in the Agriculture Sector in All India basis as per the 2020-21 Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), done by Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implementation (MoSPI). Of this Chhattisgarh has highest (66.02%) and New Delhi has lowest (0.25%).

Climate change impact studies conducted by ICAR institutes under National Innovation in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) include vulnerability assessment of wetland fisheries in various states. Climate campaigns and awareness programs are being implemented to increase fishermen’s preparedness and adaptive capacity to climate change.

Fisheries research institutes backed by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), Government of India, regularly conduct research to understand the effects of climate change in regard to making climate-resilient strategies that will help fisheries and aquaculture sustain. Climate change impact studies conducted by ICAR institutes under ‘National Innovation in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) consist of- 

• Evaluation of the risk factor for Wetland fisheries in Assam, West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha and Kerala.
• Analysis of climate trends in major river basins of India
• Influence on a range of fish distribution, composition of their catch and yields, etc. 

In marine fisheries, the NICRA project is conducting studies on models on climate change, projection of fish catch and mariculture production in the presence of climate change scenarios, assessment of risk and vulnerability for marine fisheries, wetland mapping, carbon footprint, blue carbon potential, ocean acidification, the effect of climate change on the catch and cultured species, and adaptive management in response to climate change. 

To spread awareness of Climate change, campaigns and awareness programs are held in the states of Odisha, Assam, West Bengal and Kerala. This will help in increasing the adaptiveness and preparation of fishermen for climate change.

The area under rabi crops has increased to 526.27 lakh hectares from 457.80 lakh hectares (which is 15% more than 2021-22 i.e. difference of 68.47 lakh hectares) according to the recent data released by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare. Among all these crops, the wheat crop tops the list. 

Crop and its area data of Increase

• The wheat area has increased to 255.76 lakh ha from 203.92 lakh ha i.e. 51.85 lakhs is the net increase. 
• The oilseeds cultivation area raised to 95.19 from 87.65lakh ha, which is 7.55lakh ha more than the year 2021-22. Among this 7.55 lakh ha, rapeseed and mustard together occupy 7.17 lakh hectares. (Due to the Special Mustard Mission for the last 2 years risen rapeseed and mustard by 17%  between 2019-20 and 2021-22). 
• Pulses area surged to 127.07 lakh ha from 123.77 lakh ha (a difference of 3.30 lakh ha from the previous year). Gram has shown a greater increase which is 2.14 lakh ha out of 3.30 lakh ha. up
• There is a remarkable growth of 4.34 lakh hectares area under cultivation of coarse cum Nutri-cereals. Recently it is 36.39 lakh ha in comparison to the previous year’s area of 32.05 lakh ha.