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Agricultural Current Affairs From Jan 2022 to June 2022

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 ICAR-Indian Institute of Spices Research in Kozhikode has been awarded the ‘Sardar Patel Outstanding ICAR Institution Award’ for the year 2021. The award was presented to C. K. Thankamani, Director of the Institute, by Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare in New Delhi.

This award was given based on the institute's performance over the last five years. It consists of a Rs10 lakh cash award, a citation, and a plaque.

This award is given to institutes based on several criteria, including significant output/outcome from research activities, the number, and quality of research publications, technologies licensed/commercialized, infrastructure developed, and capacity-building efforts. This is the third time that the IISR has received this honour.

"The award is a timely recognition for the institute's hard work and dedicated efforts in developing several cutting-edge technologies for advancing spice farming and addressing the real challenges faced by the spice farming community," Thankamani said.

Bindu Joseph, a young Kozhikode farmer, was awarded the Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay Antyodaya Krishi Puruskar. The award honours the contributions of marginal, small, and landless farmers to the development of integrated and sustainable agricultural farming models.

About ICAR- Indian Institute of Spices Research

The Indian Institute of Spices Research (IISR), Kozhikode (Calicut), is a major Institute devoted to spice research and is a constituent body of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). It began as a Regional Station of the Central Plantation Crops Research Institute (CPCRI), Kasaragod, engaged in spice research in 1976.

In 1986, the former Regional Station of CPCRI in Kozhikode and the Cardamom Research Centre in Appangala, Karnataka merged to form the National Research Centre for Spices, with headquarters in Kozhikode, Kerala. Recognizing the significance of spice research in India, the Research Centre was renamed Indian Institute of Spices Research on July 1, 1995.

International Day Of Cooperatives:

100th International Day of Cooperatives was observed.

• India celebrated the day under the theme “Building a Self-Reliant India and a Better World through Co-operatives”.
• The International Day of Cooperatives was declared by the United Nations General Assembly on 16th December 1992, on the first Saturday of July.
• The purpose of this festival is to promote cooperatives globally and foster an environment that will foster their expansion and profitability.
• The occasion highlights the cooperative movement’s contributions to tackling the major issues addressed by the United Nations as well as to enhancing and expanding the alliances between the cooperative movement internationally and other actors.
• It aims to raise awareness of cooperatives and further the values of the movement—
  • International solidarity,
  • Economic efficiency,
  • Equality,
  • Global peace.
• Theme for 2022: Cooperatives Build a Better World.

 The Centre has created a National Farmers’ Database with records of 5.5 crore farmers, which it hopes to increase to 8 crore farmers by December by linking it to State land record databases, according to Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar.

• Farmers’ database is key to advances in digital agriculture. Agriculture has to be linked with digital technology, scientific research and knowledge.
• The national database was created by taking data from existing national schemes such as PM-KISAN, soil health cards and the insurance scheme PM Fasal Bima Yojna.
• So far, 5.5 crore farmers had been identified in this manner.
• The Minister urged the States to create their own databases using the national database’s federated structure and also allow linkages to the land records maintained by the States.
• With the help of State governments, a total of eight crore farmers would be included by the end of the year. He also urged to study the Karnataka model for digital agriculture presented at the conference.
• In July, Mr. Tomar told the Lok Sabha that the database could be used “for targeted service delivery with higher efficiency and in a focussed and time-bound manner” and that it was the core for the proposed Agristack digital agriculture ecosystem.
• Already, companies such as Microsoft, Amazon and Patanjali had been asked to develop technology solutions for farmers using data from the database.
• Activists have raised privacy and consent concerns about using farmers’ data in such a way.

 Centre government, for the first time issued uniform specifications for Fortified Rice Kernels (FRK) for grade A & Common Rice. The specifications have been issued by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution.

• The fortified rice is to be distributed under various government schemes, including the public distribution system (PDS) and midday meals in schools, by 2024.

Rice fortification:

• The country has high levels of malnutrition among women and children.
• According to the Food Ministry, every second woman in the country is anaemic and every third child is stunted.
• India ranks 94 out of 107 countries and is in the ‘serious hunger’ category on the Global Hunger Index (GHI).
• Malnutrition and lack of essential nutrients in poor women and poor children poses major obstacles in their development.
• Food fortification is defined as the practice of adding vitamins and minerals to commonly consumed foods during processing to increase their nutritional value.
• It is a proven, safe and cost-effective strategy for improving diets and for the prevention and control of micronutrient deficiencies.
• The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), defines fortification as “deliberately increasing the content of essential micronutrients in a food so as to improve the nutritional quality of food and to provide public health benefit with minimal risk to health”.
• According to the Food Ministry, fortification of rice is a cost-effective and complementary strategy to increase vitamin and mineral content in diets.
• According to FSSAI norms, 1 kg fortified rice will contain iron (28 mg-42.5 mg), folic acid (75-125 microgram) and Vitamin B-12 (0.75-1.25 microgram).
• In addition, rice may also be fortified with micronutrients, singly or in combination, with zinc (10 mg-15 mg), Vitamin A (500-750 microgram RE), Vitamin B1 (1 mg-1.5 mg), Vitamin B2 (1.25 mg-1.75 mg), Vitamin B3 (12.5 mg-20 mg) and Vitamin B6 (1.5 mg-2.5 mg) per kg.
• Since the nutrients are added to staple foods that are widely consumed, this is an excellent method to improve the health of a large section of the population, all at once.
• Fortification is a safe method of improving nutrition among people. The addition of micronutrients to food does not pose a health risk to people.
• It does not require any changes in food habits and patterns of people. It is a socio-culturally acceptable way to deliver nutrients to people.
• It does not alter the characteristics of the food—the taste, the feel, the look.
• It can be implemented quickly as well as show results in improvement of health in a relatively short period of time.
• This method is cost-effective especially if advantage is taken of the existing technology and delivery platforms.

 Farmers in India are gathering in the largest rice crop in history, which promises record exports, while making sure to keep up their longest-running protest, set to turn a year old next month.