FAISALABAD:The Ayub Agricultural Research Institute (AARI) has started sale of bacteria-culture packets on cheap rates for the farmers to increase hormones in the soil for getting healthy crops.
A spokesman for the AARI said here on Saturday that the farmers were in the habit of burning and destroying residues of their crops after harvesting them. In this way, they not only pollute the environment and causing smog but also they eliminate the beneficial bacteria in the soil.
He said that beneficial bacteria played a pivotal role in the health and growth of the plants. Therefore, the farmers should avoid from burning residues of their crops rather they should mix them in the soil so that it could increase fertility of the land.
He said that bio-fertilizer which referred to the culture of bacteria with its positive effects on the soil health and growth of the plants as well as its yield, provided better nutrients to the crops including nitrogen, phosphorus, potash, zinc, boron and iron. Hence, the farmers should increase their crop production by using dung, manure and remains of the crops which were a major source of bio-fertilizers.
He said that bio-fertilizer increased hormones and the hormones played an active role in increasing immunity against various diseases and injurious germs present in the soil. When the farmers used organic culture with irrigation after mixing the residues of paddy crops, wheat, sugarcane, corn, vegetables, etc. in the ground under favorable conditions, these residues would decompose in 15 to 20 days and significantly increased the amount of organic matter in the soil.
The developed as well as developing countries of the world like America, Europe, Russia, China, India and Japan etc., after latest research on bio-fertilizer had started work on manufacturing various products from it, he said, adding that research of AARI scientists on bio-fertilizer also gained positive results and proved that bio-fertilizer played a pivotal role in restoring health of the soil in addition to increasing crop production.
He said that use of bio-fertilizer also save the crop and its production from ill-impacts of chemical fertilizer besides playing a key role in reducing environmental pollution.
He said that AARI had also started sale of bacteria-culture packets on cheap rates. The farmers could purchase them at Rs.150 per packet and use them for early decomposing of dung and manure applied in the field as organic fertilizer, he added.