18 Dec Utility, scope and implementation of System of Rice Intensification (SRI) in Kashmir Valley
कश्मीर घाटी में चावल गहनता (एसआरआई) प्रणाली के कार्यान्वयन की गुंजाइश व उपयोगिता “The system of rice intensification (SRI)" is a method of rice cultivation that involves efficient utilization of natural resources in conjunction with judicious use of external inputs to produce optimum rice yield. Although SRI is best explained operationally in terms of making certain changes in conventional rice-growing practices, it is not best defined in terms of practices. SRI is a strategy of irrigated rice production, adapted to local conditions, that alters plant, soil, water and nutrient management practices with the purpose of (a) inducing larger and better-functioning root systems, and (b) more abundant, diverse and active communities of soil biota that live in association with the root systems.These organisms include both flora and fauna. SRI cultivation is a system rather than a technology. It is based on the insights that rice has the potential to produce more tillers and grains than now observed and that early transplanting and optimal growth conditions spacing, humidity, biological active and healthy soil and aerobic soil conditions during vegetative growth can fulfill this potential. Presently sizeable farmers are practicing SRI in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal & Punjab, Orissa and has been also initiated in Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Jammu and Kashmir, Bihar,...