Farmers in parts of Gujarat have increasingly started turning towards plasticulture - a technique to use plastics in the agricultural application - thereby saving crucial natural resource, i.e. water and reducing the use of pesticides.

The use of plasticulture in the form of pond lining, drip irrigation, sprinkler irrigation, mulching, greenhouses among others has brought down the use of water by 40 per cent, fertilizers by 30-40 per cent and the electricity consumption at the farms. Resultantly, farmers taking crops such as spices, vegetables and other cash crops like banana, cotton, groundnut and castor have witnessed their overall incomes rising by 2-3 times.

"Use of drip irrigation is helping us reduce the use of water. Also, plastic mulching helps reduce the weeds and pest attack in crops such as cotton. The weed management methods helped reduce use of insecticides by half and increase in the yield. Our costs have gone down and profits have increased," said Hitesh Patel, cotton grower at Wadhwan in Surendranagar district.

Farmers growing other cash crops such as banana, watermelon have stared using fruit cover, PP non-woven fabric to keep the fruit from insects and weather extremities.

Joining the lot is a chili farmer from Kheda district, Bharat Patel used a mix of drip irrigation and plastic mulching for his crop on 3 acre land. "Drip irrigation led to bumper crop despite of the limited water availability. The plant grows faster and healthier. Last year my net profit was around Rs 4.5 lakh, but this year on a conservative estimate we expect to touch Rs 12 lakh with same area and crop," said Patel, who has taken capsicum and other varieties of chili.

Reliance Industries Limited (RIL)'s Plasticulture Development Centre (PDC) near Vadodara provides training and demonstration to the farmers from across the state to adopt best practices by using plasticulture.

According to scientists at the PDC, India has very negligible plasticulture usage. As against the global average of 32 kg per capita consumption per annum, plastic consumption in agriculture in India hardly reaches around 1 kg, while that of the United States is about 100 kg.

In order to encourage farmers to take up modern techniques in the farming and conserve natural resources, PDC teams up with states and central government agencies to help farmers avail subsidies in the offing and make the most of them.

Every year, PDC and the Reliance Foundation Information Services (RFIS) trains around 15,000 farmers across the country to adopt plasticulture applications such as greenhouses, low tunnel, nursery bags, plant protection nets and many more for optimum use of water, fertilizer, electricity, labor etc, and increase productivity for better value addition.

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