Innovative farmers to be honoured at Kisan, Pashu Palan Melas
The Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) will honour five progressive farmers and one farm woman on the first day of the Kisan Mela on September 13.
Holding 11 acres of ancestral land, Kulwinder Kaur of Kath Mathi of Patiala, will be presented ‘Sardarni Jagbir Kaur Grewal Memorial Award’ for being a progressive entrepreneur. She has acquired training in milk production, phulkari embroidery, and tie and dye, and is contributing to economic enhancement of her family through garment enrichment as well as dairy farming in terms of milk supply to the villagers. Besides, she grows less water consuming rice varieties, moong and dhaincha, levels field with Laser Land Leveller and uses organic manure to reduce input cost.
A self-cultivating small farmer, Karnail Singh, resident of Bassi Gulam Hussain village, Hoshiarpur, will be feted with ‘Sardar Surjit Singh Dhillon Award’ for his dedication to organic vegetable cultivation. He has contributed towards residue-free vegetable production through the use of vermi-compost for soil health maintenance and mulching technique for weed management.
Another small farmer from Tharajwala village of Sri Muktsar Sahib, Gurpeet Singh will also be conferred with the award for gaining strides in crop diversification through productive vegetable cultivation.
A 50-year-old progressive farmer, Bal Krishan, resident of Bhulan village, Sangrur, will be awarded ‘Sardar Dalip Singh Dhaliwal Memorial Award’ for touching great heights in agriculture during a span of 30 years. Bal Krishan has never set straw ablaze since 2013. He complements his income through mushroom cultivation, beekeeping, poultry farming, agro-processing and value addition via desi ghee and sarson oil extraction.
Belonging to Hayatpura, Samrala tehsil of Ludhiana, Mohandeep Singh will be honoured with ‘Sardar Ujjagar Singh Dhaliwal Memorial Award’ for his devotion to vegetable production on 25-35 acres during 12 years of agricultural experience. He sows different colours of carrot comprising red on 26 acres, yellow on two acres, orange on 20 acres, white on one acre and black on eight acres, white and red radish on 10 and one acre, French beans on 14 acres, chilies on 10 acres, pumpkin on 15 acres and cauliflower on eight acres.
Vet varsity’s CM Awards
Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Ludhiana, will confer three awards to progressive livestock farmers of the state in the upcoming Pashu Palan Mela on September 13.
In order to motivate various categories of livestock farmers, the university has instituted Chief Minister’s Awards in various categories of livestock farming. During the upcoming Pashu Palan Mela, three CM Awards which are to be conferred to progressive livestock farmers are in cattle farming, poultry farming and value addition of livestock produce respectively.
In the cattle farming category, Harpreet Singh from Sohal, Tarntaran, will get the award. He has 145 cows and the daily milk production at his farm is 12.5 quintals. He had established a modern milking parlor and an ultra-modern shed. He has tagged all his animals and uses all modern Artificial Intelligence techniques to record every activity of the animals.
In the poultry farming category, Gurdarshan Singh Tiwana from Chanarthal Khurd, Fatehgarh Sahib, will get the award. He started broiler farming in 2004 and established environment controlled, tunnel ventilated sheds in 2017. Now he rears 60,000 broilers per batch (6 batches per year) thereby producing over 3,50,000 broilers per annum. He gets his feed customised according to the age of the birds in crumb form to improve the feed conversion ratio. These awards carry a plaque, shawl, citation and cash.
