Integrated Pest Management in Mustard crop through Farmers Participatory mode

Abstract

Indian mustard is mainly cultivated in India. ICAR-NCIPM has been working on synthsis and validation of IPM mustard over two decades.Extensive surveys of mustard revealed excessive and injudicious use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers that aggravated the pest menance, secondary pest outbreaks and caused environmental degradation. THe key pest of mustard are Broomrape weed, Sclerotinia rot, white rust, Alternaria blight and aphids. Crop stage-base implementation of IPM mustard module was undertaken in 60 ha in collaboration with adopted KVKs in farmers' participatory mode on farmers' fields in Rajasthan and Haryana State of India. The key determinants of cost and returns in crop were compared across the IPM technology and farmers practices which provides 10% advantage to IPM. Each additional rupee invested in the adoption of technology gave 5.1 in return, thus giving good economic logic for adoption of technology. Validation of IPM in mustard in farmers' participatory mode: A sucess Story was done village Siyali Khurd (Alwar, Rajasthan). IN IPM mustard seed treatment with Trichoderma, recommended dose of fertilized along with gypsum @250 kg / ha and Potash 40 kg / ha, soil application of Trichoderma @2.5 kg / ha pre-incubated in 50 kg well rotten FYM were followed. Implementation of IPM Mustard resulted in significant reduction in the severity of Sclerotinia rot with higher yield as well as higher benefit cost ratio as compared to farmers' practices.