| Background |
| Surulivel (70), a progressive
farmer, has developed and propagated a variety of cardamom having the
qualities of high productivity, large sized capsules and high growth
rate. His family comprises his wife, son and two daughters. He has
been cultivating cardamom and coconut on the 30 acres of land he has in
Kerala for the past 40 years. |
| With plans to start
cultivation, he bought a piece of dry rocky land in 1969. The land was
mostly covered by weeds like Pterolobium hexapetalum and Lantana
camara and was not suitable for cultivation. Toiling hard, he
moved the big rocks and used them for building rock bunds, which were
incorporated with native soil, cow dung and dried leaves. This prevented
soil erosion and improved its fertility. As he found the land suitable for
cardamom cultivation, he planted many varieties in it.Since cardamom
plants require more shade, he planted Artocarpus heterophyllus
(Jackfruit1 ) trees between the
cardamom saplings. |
| Genesis |
| In late sixties, SuruIivel
started cultivating cardamom (Mysore type) on his farm. Then in 1986, he
came across some other varieties, which grew well in both drought and
water logged conditions.His wife who has been quite observant pointed out
two plants that outperformed others in the field. He noted the
quantitative and qualitative traits of these plants such as growth, yield,
and resistance to pests, diseases and abiotic stress viz. drought
tolerance, water logging, aroma, oil content, etc. over the next
five years. |
| A senior scientist of Indian
Cardamom Research Institute, visited his field, appreciated his efforts
and encouraged him to mass-multiply these two plants by adopting
propagation techniques. The words of appreciation from an expert egged him
and he started preparing clones of the plants to use them as planting
material in his own estate. |
 |
| He isolated planted this
variety in one acre of land in 1991. He multiplied the selected lines by
vegetative propagation. The planting 3 x 3 x 2 feet pits were filled with
lime powder, compost and topsoil. The split suckers were planted in pits
and protected from wind by supporting the plants with stakes. Dried leaves
were used for mulching to prevent soil erosion and to conserve soil
moisture. Then organic manure was applied at three months interval.Five
years later in 1996, the plants started yielding. He named the variety as
‘PNS- Vaigai’, PNS standing for his name (P.N.Surulivelu) and Vaigai, which is the name of the river flowing nearby in the Cumbum valley. |
| Innovation |
| The PNS- Vaigai seed size is
large compared to the local variety Njallani. The yield is higher
and consistent: 900-1400 kg/acre from 1996 till date. The number of
internodes (average 40-45) is higher than in the locally popular
varieties. The rhizomes are bigger, bolder bearing 3-4 inflorescences
each, which in turn bear around 25-32 racemes each. The rind (skin of
capsule) is thin and hence the recovery percentage is higher than
Njallani. In addition, there is no difficulty in post harvesting. In
fact, the driage recovery has been higher than in the local variety.
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The market response for it has also been very
encouraging and it has been commanding prices, at least 15-20 percent
higher than other local varieties. Since 60-70 percent of the produce is 7
mm and above, the income from per unit of land is also higher than other
local varieties. So far he has sold 2,50,000 sapling to many farmers
of the region. Now most of the cardamom growers in his area have started
growing PNS-Vaigai and a vast area under cardamom cultivation is covered
by this variety alone.Apart from receiving public recognition at local
level many times, Surulivel also won ICAR Spices Board’s (Kerala) first
prize for achieving the highest productivity in cardamom (3250 kg of dried
capsules/ha) during the year 2002-2003 by). High yielding planting
material, maintenance of soil fertility through judicious application of
organic manures and systematic soil and moisture conversation practices
helped him in reaching the top position among cardamom growers. Given
his vast experience and expertise in agriculture, he was invited to NIF’s
informal Research Advisory Committee meeting in May 2006 to meet fellow
innovators and also participate in the traditional food festival, Saatvik,
organised by SRISTI-NIF in November 2006, where the response to his
cardamom variety was overwhelming. |
