Friday, February 05, 2010
Technical support will be provided to interested farmers or entrepreneurs


Bangalore: Efforts to encourage bio-fuels in the State got a boost with the University of Agricultural Sciences-Bangalore setting up a “Bio-fuel Information Centre and Lab”— said to be the first of its kind in the country — providing complete technology, right from cultivation of bio-fuel plants to production of bio-diesel. The highlight of the lab, which was inaugurated by Medical Education Minister Ramachandra Gowda on Thursday on the university campus, is that it uses simple technologies which can be understood and the machinery operated by farmers without depending on technical personnel.

Bio-fuel project coordinator and Karnataka Bio-fuel Task Force member Balakrishna Gowda told presspersons that scientists at the university had put in nearly 12 years on research to evolve such technologies that were now presented in a package format in the above lab for the benefit of farmers and entrepreneurs.

The information centre would provide technical support to farmers or entrepreneurs interested in bio-fuels.

The UAS-B had developed these options to suit small and marginal farmers in a bid to provide additional income to them.

“We want to ensure that the income from the bio-fuel plant cultivation helps in sustaining agriculture so that farming becomes remunerative and farmers do not migrate to cities,”Prof. Gowda said. This model of bio-fuel encourages farmers to have 10-15 bio-fuel plants per acre, mostly in border areas, ravines and barren lands instead of fertile areas. A bio-fuel plant such as “honge” would yield 10 to 15 kg of seeds a year when it is about five years of age.

UAS-B Vice-Chancellor P.G. Chengappa made it clear that bio-fuel plants would not be an alternative to food crops and that they would only be grown as additional crops to meet the energy requirements.
The State Government on Thursday announced Baradu Bangara (gold in wasteland) project envisaging cultivation of bio-fuel plants on wasteland with the twin objective of raising the income of farmers and taking care of the increasing energy requirements.

The project was announced by Minister for Medical Education Ramachandra Gowda on behalf of Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa at the inauguration of the Bio-Fuel Information Centre and Lab of the UAS here. The Minister said the Government would bring one lakh hectares of wasteland under bio-fuel plants in the next three years. Of this, 25,000 hectares of land had been identified and 1.5 crore bio-fuel saplings would be grown during the next rainy season.