In Association with:
Gajanan Haribhau Karluke, Majara, Tal- Arvi, Dist. Wardha, Maharashtra
I, Gajanan Haribhau Karluke, from Majara village with 12th standard education has to take care of a 4 member family with wife, father and a mother. I have 1.75 acre land.
We are dependent on agricultural income for the family needs. Earlier my father was cultivating the farm and handling everything. But the low income from the agriculture and continuous stress of family needs and the low income have forced me to help my father. Even we could not get the money to meet the need of investment in agriculture itself. We had a stressful life due to the very low income from the agriculture and absence of other income source for our needs.
The year 2015 came with a ray of hope in our life. The HDFC Bank’s HRDP project started in our village under the Parivartan initiative. In our village SIED started the work with the participation of the community. This project have different activities been implemented in the village and all leading to the development of the families of our village. Activities like farm bunding to conserve soil and water, solar wire fencing, horticulture plantation, construction of cement check dams, sprinkler irrigation, etc. All these activities together have increased the water availability in the village.
A vegetable demonstration was started in my farm. I have planted tomato as a vegetable crop on 0.20 acre of my land. Total 2500 plants of tomato have been planted in my filed. The mini sprinkler is installed to irrigate the tomato crop to minimize the water losses and to use the available water most efficiently. SIED staff regularly gave me important information on the crop paste, diseases, water needs, etc. I sold myself the tomato’s in the market to get more money and from the profit I had, I purchased the shed net, bamboo sticks and installed it for the crop. This has helped me greatly to have the increased income.
The total tomato production from this area is 3000 kg. With the market rate of Rs. 20/Kg the total income is Rs. 60,000/-. Total cost of input is Rs. 32,200/- The net profit is of Rs. 27,800/- As this is his first crop the investment cost is more. From next crop onwards the input cost will be significantly lower and the proportionately there will be increase in the net gain from the crop.
Since then I had crop in the shed net and I got a good profit. Nowadays I regularly plant brinjal and tomato’s and get the reasonably good profit.