Visits to Farmers in Faridkot and Action items

Dear Pagri Supporters and well wishers,

Our Secretary Harinder Lamba visited Faridkot March 7-8, 2023 and was hosted by Balwinder Singh. Gurlal Singhji drove us around – thanks! Here are the action items and description of the visit.

Faridkot – Action Items
1.     Help 2-5 farmers with Desi chickens for eggs, together with chicken coop (shed) and enclosure to protect from stray dogs (all visited during trip). As my description will show, broilers are a very sad story and even one farmer who is rearing them, wants to desperately get out of raising them (these chicks were all sickly and expenses very high). Desi chicks may be procured from PAU at a discount. For each farmer that is helped we will need to know their annual farm income so that we can compare it with their income after we help them.. Also, Balwinder will need to begin providing regular reports that can be posted on website and on Dasvandh.
2.     Gurmail Bhullar – NRI from Norway, Moga district – wants to do Integrated Farming on 1 acre (NO COST TO US – need Balwinder to spend a little time to guide – receives same chickens as Item 1 – he should be able to afford these on his own)
3.     Fruit trees – 2-3 farmers to begin with – consider our Gurdaspur expert as supplier also (see below), or procure them from PAU at a discount.
4.     Demonstration plots:
a.     Help Gurlal Singh (1.5 acres) to develop full Integrated Model – he is fully willing.
b.     Jasmeet Singh (owner of Implement business with turnover of Rs. 5 crore) is willing to have his 4 kanal farm near his house used as demonstration plot and integrated farming model (NO COST TO US – Balwinder is already helping him and would need to spend time)
5.     Marketing Stands:
a.     In summer heat they need a shade protected stand in middle of Faridkot town near their current stand on Tuesdays and Saturdays at 4:30 pm
b.     A marketing stand at corner of two roads right next to farm of Gurlal Singh – major traffic here – this will help our areas farmers including Sukhwinderpal Singh who is nearby
6.     Get help for about 40 Bee Keeping farmers for their honey processing (see below). We met with two farmers, one with 250 boxes and one with 120 boxes

Description of Visit to Faridkot District with Balwinder Singh
(March 7-8, 2023)

Harvinder Nishkamji arranged for me to stay at the Dental College guest house (thanks to Baltej Singh also). It felt unique to be staying at a dental college residential campus where dental students reside. Kabal Singh, who was visiting from Edmonton Canada joined us for the visits on the first day (March 7). I believe he has expertise as a soil scientist. On the second day, Harvinder Nishkamji joined us. I stayed the night with him and early morning he left me on his scooter to the bus stand where I took the Volvo bus to Chandigarh.

Kabal Singh’s thoughts and recommendations: Punjab has alluvial soil and it needs chemical and organic fertilizers. For grain, stalks and roots of 1 Quintal, of 15-20 Kg of nutrients only 5-7 Kg are left. If you rely only on organic fertilizer, in 2-3 years all the nutrients will be gone at current rates of production (?). He had sent an article by SPS Brar to Lal Singhji. Fertilizer increases yield by 3-4 times, and one needs to do soil test and apply fertilizer accordingly. Excess fertilizer is bad as it leaches down (or creates Algae blooms in lakes and causes a deficiency of oxygen in the water – it’s called biological oxygen demand or BOD).

All of the cow manure will not provide enough fertilizer for Punjab. Still, every piece of organic matter should be recycled, and Nitrogen fixing plants should be used to the maximum – Alfalfa, peas, beans, burseem, etc. Nonetheless, Gurbinder Bajwa is indicating that after rice harvest, if the straw (parali) is used as mulch rather than burned, the chemical fertilizer need is less., less water is needed, and the plants are more robust and may need less pesticides and herbicides.

Visits to Farmers at their farms

1.     Jagmeet Singh – organic farmer – with a good section on many fruit trees. He was growing peaches, cjiku, papaya, guava, and Chinese guava (sweet). He was also growing both small and large leaf methi. Oats are used as feed for cattle. He would like to have goats and from sugar cane process jaggery.
2.     Jasmeet Singh – He owns a Rs 5 crore business making farm implements – his 4 kanal farm is managed as an organic farm by Balwinder – this farm can be used as a demonstration plus education site. He is willing. We will attempt to convince him to include implements needed by small farmers in his business (Gurbinder Bajwa has designed some of these).
3.     Kuldeep Singh & Harjeet Singh – Bee Keeping farmers with 250 and 120 boxes respectively – met at Kuldeep Singh’s house and not at their bee keeping farm – there are about 40 farmers that badly need help with a honey processing plant (estimate about Rs 20 lakhs for a plant that would meet the needs of the 40 farmers – this plant would sanitize the bottles, filter the honey and separate the wax extract and bee pollen. They also have beeswax and bee pollen (very tasty and nutritious) as side products they sell. Bees provide valuable pollination service for free. Kuldeep Singh also does wheat and rice on a 2.5 acre farm. Price of honey about Rs 350-400 per Kg – but they struggle against adulterated honey on the market (He filled out the form).
4.     Udeekwan Singh: This visit was amazing. He had a large area under organic garlic (with mulch) as well as a very good onion nursery (paniri). He had a very good organic farm, has won many awards, and received a lot of training. One video was posted and another awards related video was posted later. He would benefit from action of a chicken section. He is an expert on growing organic garlic  and onion paniri (nursery).
5.     Gurlal Singh: Owns a little over 3 acres and rents about 1.5 acre - He drove us around everywhere for two days. Some videos taken on his farm were posted. On many aspects he demonstrated a very high level of knowledge of crop varieties and organic farming. Goats can be added but need labor to manage for grazing.  He showed a few desi varieties of wheat on his farm that he was growing which local people want to eat – they don’t want to eat the high yielding green revolution varieties. (He had filled out form). He is willing to convert his farm totally to the integrated model.
6.     Balwinder Singh (Our Project Leader): His own farm is about 4 kanal and is an amazing example of the organic approach – understand what is going on (pests, weeds and yield issues) and modify strategy accordingly rather than take short cuts by attacking with chemicals straight away – the organic approach works best and is the lowest cost in all areas except labor cost. His son is imbibing his knowledge – that’s the kind of education we need!!
7.     Baldev Singh: He only raises chickens for meat and had about 2,000 birds in a brick and concrete shed. His broiler chickens were very unhappy and sickly and hardly able to stand (this was noted at least another roadside location where desi chickens were happy and robust and white broiler chickens were sickly). These need expensive company supplied feed (cost of each bag went up from Rs 1,300 to Rs. 2,200 recently, while the price fetched by fully grown chickens was the same or may go down. He seemed to have a good knowledge of organic farming. He is desperate to transition out of the broiler corporate controlled trap to desi chickens for eggs. (He has filled out form)
8.     Baljit Singh: He has a little over 3 acres. This farmer is not only an excellent organic farmer but also has taught other farmers. He has a meager Rs. 2 lakhs annual income and would really benefit from the addition of Desi Chickens (He has filled out the form).
9.     Marketing Stands: Visited a marketed stand manned by Joginder Singh and Jagsir Singh (organic farmers) in Faridkot town. This they do at 4:30 pm every Tuesday and Saturday. Their produce sells well and is in demand. Problems are that they are located at a very traffic congested site and that as summer temperatures rise it will get very hot. They badly need a covered shed constructed at slightly less congested location. Also, Gurlal Singh’s farm is on the intersection of major road and a side road – it would be beneficial to construct a small covered roadside farm stand to sell their organic produce at the intersection – this could be used by more than one farmer.
Some of the things they mentioned that would help them:
1.     Desi Free Ranging Chickens which they can sell under their own brand (First thought of Pagri to is to start with this).
2.     Goats – but these need labor for grazing and milking
3.     Cold storage
4.     Honey processing
5.     Training for the above