This Journo Quit His Job To Cultivate A Rice Variety That Might Solve India's Food Crisis!
Pamarthi Hemasundar 47 has quit as a journalist from a leading Telugu daily to respond to the call by the Agriculture university authorities to start diabetes rice cultivation. The dia rice as it is called can grow even in severe drought conditions and brings in rich dividends.
Telangana and Andhra Pradesh may be reeling under severe agrarian crisis leading to a spurt in farmer suicides, but an enterprising journalist, who took to cultivation only a few months ago, has shown the two states the road to farming prosperity.
Giving it all up for diabetes rice
Pamarthi Hemasundar, 47, has quit as a journalist from a leading Telugu daily, to respond to the call by the Agriculture university authorities to start 'diabetes rice' cultivation. The dia rice, as it is called, can grow even in severe drought conditions and brings in rich dividends.
Hemasundar cultivated RNR15048 variety in 10 acres in Pedana near Machilipatnam in Krishna district in his very first year in farming. "It took fewer than 40 percent of the water that is required for other paddy varieties. And, the input cost was fewer than Rs 10,000 per acre", Hemasundar told Mirror, attending phone calls while in the field. As many depressed farmers around his land are feeding cattle in their parched paddy fields, Pamarthi is expecting 40 bags of paddy per acre, fetching him good returns. Dia rice or RNR15048 variety rice, he says, fetches at least 4,000 per bag of 50 kgs.
"We are trying to introduce this rice in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana markets first. We expect good response," says he. According to agriculture scientist B Murali, who was part of the team that invented this variety in 2013, the duration of this crop is only 125 days, while it is 145 days for other varieties.
Why diabetes rice is good for you
Two more farmers in Krishna district will be harvesting in another seven to 10 days. Scientists at the Agriculture university say dia rice is thinner than the usually preferred Kurnool Sona Masoori rice and has 20 percent less carbohydrate content compared to the normal varieties (usually, 100 gram cooked rice has 120 calories). Usually, diabetics are advised to eat less quantity of rice or switch over to wheat and jowar. Now, this variety enables them continue eating rice, claim the scientists.
(Originally published in the Bangalore Mirror)
