The scientists at the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) at Puthurvayal in Kalpetta are all set to implement a novel project, a community gene bank to promote and propagate the seeds of the traditional rice, vegetables and yam varieties of Malabar region in association with the selected farmers including the tribal farming communities in the district.
“We are planning to conserve and multiply the lost traditional rice varieties on farm now a day by the help of tribal and other traditional rice farmers in the Malabar region under the project”, Dr. Anilkumar, Director MSSRF told The Hindu on Sunday.
The changing climate in the present scenario has been posing a severe menace to the farming community in the country and it is the need of the hour to preserve and multiply the traditional rice seed varieties to improve the adaptation mechanism of farmers in view of the likelihood of climate change impacts as the seed varieties have an innate drought resisting and light sensitive nature, he added.
The project will be implemented by Seed Care, a farmers’ collective to promote the traditional seed cultivation, with the technical support of the scientists of MSSRF. The project envisages to provide the seeds of as many as 50 lost varieties of rice crops, which have been preserved in the gene bank of MSSRF in Chennai under the leadership of Dr. M. Geetharani based on a collection provided by a group of scientists led by Dr. Anilkumar in 1990s from the region.
In the preliminary stage the MSSRF would provide the samples of traditional seeds to the members of the Seed Care at free of cost. Apart from the rice varieties the Seed Care will promote the cultivation of different traditional varieties of lesser yam, pepper, ginger and vegetable seed in the near future, Dr. Anilkumar added.
We have planned to offer two types of memberships to the farmers such as individual membership and family membership but preference would be given to the traditional farming community especially the tribal farming communities such as Kuruma and Kurichya tribes in the district. The Seed Care would also under take the crop registration processes of the traditional seeds for its members as per the norms of the Union Agriculture Ministry. The first meeting of Seed Care will be held at the MSSRF Auditorium at 2.p.m on Wednesday and the interested farmers can join the farmers’ collective at that occasion, Dr. Anil Kumar said.
