ATMA, is society of stakeholders involved in Agricultural activities for sustainable Agricultural Development. It is a Focal Point of Integrating Research and Extension activities land decentralizing day to day management of public Agricultural Technology system.
In Karaikal there are 11 Uzhavar Udhaviyagams and each has 3 ATMA groups. I am the BBT Convener of ATMA, Surakudy.
Surakudy Uzhavar Udhaviyagam has 3 Revenue villages - Surakudy, Devamaburam and Subrayaburam. SUrakudy ATMA group is Komatha ATMA group, members are farmers with milch animals. So they were given training and demonstration about increasing milk yield through fodder feeding. They were given free fodder slips to cultivate in their backyards.
I want to share the excitement I had when I saw one farmer's backyard. The farmer's name is Sinnappa, living in Surakudy. He is a widower. He lives with his daughter(a widow). He is a poor farmer. All farmers in that group were given with 100 slips of CO3 Cumbu Napier hybrid fodder. The resource person for the training was Dr. George Paradis, Associate Professor, Animal Husbandry and Dr. Prasanna, Vet. Surgeon, Thirunallar, the venue of the training was PAJANCOA&RI.
He has grown the fodder slips in his backyard. He said he waters only once in 15 days. It has grown luxuriously. He and his daughter saws, previously the father has to spend entire day to find grass for the cows. Now there is abundant grass at home (20 rows), she / he can cut the grass from one row a day which is a matter of minutes and feed the animals. He goes for agricultural works as a labour. When the first cut is finished and comes for the second cut it will be around 20 days by that time the first row is grown.
The advantages he has are -
- He gets grass right at his backyard at no cost (100% Organic)
- He need not wander in search of grass and spend entire day in sun or rain
- He now goes to work and fetches income
- You know the cows (4) are yielding 1 litre extra/cow per day, this again fetches him an extra income.
You can see their smiles in these photos.
