Success Story From Adilabad District : 2

Location : Bela Village, Adilabad

Nand Kishore Amedwar, of Bela Village Dist. Adilabad, in the State of Andhra Pradesh is a small cotton farmer with 6 acres of land. Since past so many years he was habituated to applying chemical pesticides like: Dimethoate Chloropyriphos, Quinolphos, Monocrotophos & Acephate in the early stages of the crop and Synthetic Pyrethroids at boll formation stage to harvesting stage.

"Under this practice my cost of cultivation increased year by year but my returns were very poor. Since there are no other good alternative crops to raise, I was loosing confidence in the long term viability of farming and I was in a great dilemma on how to overcome this problem", says Mr. Amedwar.

Fortunately Mr. Amedwar keeps himself well informed about the current agricultural developments as he is a regular reader of agricultural magazines, and watches agriculture programs on TV. He learnt with self-interest the new biopesticide developments based on neem and happened to meet Fortune Biotech field staff. "Around 1997-98, when I was approached by Fortune Biotech for selection of my field to take up Fortune AZA trails, I immediately responded to them and gave all of my 6 acres of the cotton field for the demonstration trial purposes," said Mr. Amedwar.

Out of the 6 acres, 4 acres were treated plots and 2 acres were kept untreated as control. Fortune Aza 1500 ppm was sprayed at the rate of 5 ml in 1 litre of water at five leaf stages and continued the spray for every 15 to 20 days in combination of Acephate, Mono, Chloro & Quinol.

Apart from the cost advantage that Mr. Amedwar enjoys, he has observed all of the following advantages of Fortune products:

1. On average, an extra yield of 2.75 Quintals per Acre.
   
   
2. More Predators & Parasites population in the biopesticide treated fields than chemical treatments.
   
   
3. Phytotonic look on the field, which appears greenish even after 180 days crop.
   
   
4. Low boll damage.
   
   
5. Pink bollworm damaged is very low.