Thirty six basmati rice genotypes were evaluated under four production systems viz. Transplanted rice (TPR), System of rice intensification (SRI), Chemical free cultivation (CFC) and Wet direct seeded rice (Wet DSR) at RRS, Kaul, and RRS, Uchani (Karnal), CCS HAU, Hisar, Haryana during Kharif season of 2016 and 2017. The experiment was conducted using Randomized Complete Block Design with three replications. Yield stability and adaptability of plant height were analyzed by Eberhart and Russell’s and additive main effects and multiplicative interaction (AMMI) model. The environment, genotype main effects, and the GEI were all highly significant. The study indicated that the tested genotypes, such as Pusa 1734-8-3-85, SJR-70-3-2, PAU 6297-1, Pusa 1656-10-705, Pusa 1884-3-9-175, and Pusa-1884-9-12-14 had dwarf plant height, which indicated these genotypes adapted to favorable environments. Based on AMMI biplot analysis, the genotypes, Improved Pusa Basmati 1 and HUBR-16 with low mean and IPCA1 score close to zero, were identified as stable genotype and had general adaptation to all the environments.

The success of crop improvement programs depends on variability and heritability of desirable traits. An investigation was carried out to assess the extent of variability generated by hybridization to estimate the heritability and genetic advance as percent of mean and correlation analysis for seed cotton yield and yield component traits and fibre quality traits in F2 main crop and F2 ratoon crop generations of 32 novel upland cotton hybrids. The segregating population was evaluated for fifteen traits. It was found that the F2 main crop and F2 ratoon crop populations are superior to the parents and expressed highly significant differences for all the traits. The high phenotypic coefficient of variation and genotypic coefficient of variation were recorded for traits number of monopodial branches per plant, number of bolls per plant and seed cotton yield per plant. High heritability coupled with high genetic advances was recorded for traits number of monopodial branches per plant, number of bolls per plant, lint index, seed cotton yield per plant and fibre fineness. As results of the correlation analysis, seed cotton yield was significantly positively associated with days to first flowering, number of sympodial branches per plant, number of bolls per plant, boll weight, lint index, seed index, ginning out turn and fibre fineness. Results further revealed that F2 main crop and F2 ratoon crop generations with larger genetic potential, moderate to high heritability and positive association between yield and yield contributing traits and fibre quality traits could guide intensive selection for improvement in segregating populations.

Genetic diversity plays an important role because hybrids between lines of diverse origin generally, display a greater heterosis than those between closely related parents. Genetic diversity arises due to geographical separation or due to genetic barriers to crossability. In this study, genetic diversity of twenty two genotypes of wheat was evaluated for fourteen characters using Mahalanobis D2 statistics. The wheat genotypes were grouped into three clusters. The cluster III was the largest group which consist of 9 genotypes followed by cluster II (7 genotypes) and cluster I (6 genotypes). From the clustering pattern, it was found that the wheat genotypes were genetically diverse to each other. Hence, the genotypes studied are reliable enough for selection of parents making crosses. The maximum intra cluster distances were observed in cluster III (2.945) followed by cluster I (2.463) and cluster II (2.324). The selection of divergent genotype from above clusters would produce a broad spectrum of variability for quantitative traits studied, which enable further for selection and improvement. The maximum inter cluster distance was observed in between cluster I and cluster III (4.987) followed by between clusters II and cluster III (4.355) and cluster I and cluster II (3.717). This suggested that the hybridization programme involving parents from these clusters is expected to give higher frequency of better segregantes or desirable combination for development of useful genetic stocks or varieties.

Pesticides are the chemical or biological substances used to kill or repel targeted organisms. Pesticides are applied to the environment with the aim of suppressing the impact of plant and animal pest and to protect agricultural and industrial products (Dey et al. 2013). Exposure to pesticide results in both acute and chronic health problems which range from short term to long term effects. Keeping this in view a study was conducted to know the effect of pesticide use on the health of farming community in Dharawad taluka, Karnataka state. A survey was conducted by interview method from 130 farmers in three village of Dharawad taluka and information regarding health effects and use of personal protective clothing while spraying pesticides was collected. Majority of the farmers are suffering from various health problems like headache, dizziness, vomiting, nausea, burning vision, itching of skin burning of hands, excessive salivation and watery of eyes. All these problems are related to the indiscriminate handling of pesticides by the farmers. Use of protective clothing while spraying pesticides would help the farmers to come out from these problems.

Soil water and soil nutrient contents are the most important factors for crop productivity and agricultural sustainability. Water has become very scarce in rainfed agriculture and the cost of chemical fertilizers is increasing day by day. Nutrients availability and their translocation also reduce under limited water availability. Therefore, it is very important to manage both water and nutrient resources and to improve their use efficiency through environment friendly strategies. In the recent time, the use of zeolites has been emphasized in improving the physical and chemical properties of soils due to their high CEC, moisture holding capacity and etc. Zeolites are naturally occurring aluminosilicates with voids and channels in their inner structure, where water and nutrients are stored and exchanged. This characteristic of zeolites can be capitalized to enhance the use efficiency of fertilizers and water and to reduce the risk of environmental pollution occurring due to nitrate leaching and emissions of nitrous oxides and NH3. It is with this concern; the present review is focused on harnessing the potential of zeolites, for improving the water and nutrient use efficiency with reduced carbon foot prints.

Sesbania aculeata (Dhaincha) is a well known ‘green manure crop’ which is been widely used in organic farming as un-decomposed green manure to improve soil and crop productivity. The current study attempts to isolate and characterize (both morphologically and physiologically) Rhizobial symbionts collected from root nodules of five desi Dhaincha plants grown in five different regions of West Burdwan district, West Bengal, India. One isolate was chosen from each plant and they were designated as RW1-RW5. All of these five isolates were subjected to various biochemical tests and it was found that the strain RW3 was biochemically distinct from the other four isolates that put it in a different species category. All the five isolates were Gram negative; rod shaped bacterium and could ferment various carbohydrates as their carbon source. But it was to be noted that all the strains were weak fermenters for mannitol, the principal ingredient of the conventional YEM medium. Except RW3, all the other isolates were potent producers of amylase, an industrially important enzyme. The RW3 strain was the sole producer of cellulase, another enzyme of economic value. All the four isolates, excluding RW3 were obligate aerobic organisms giving positive results for both catalase and oxidase tests. The RW1 Rhizobial isolate was chosen at random for further physiological studies and it was found that its optimum temperature and pH for growth was 28 °C and & 7.0, respectively that reflected the typical features of Rhizobiaceae family. It was a non-halophile exhibiting maximum growth at only 1% concentration of NaCl. It was later subjected to large scale cultivation (5-10 liters of broth media) with a potential to be applied as a biofertilizer by designing a suitable broth medium instead of the normal YEM broth. 6% glucose yielded maximum biomass along with 1.5% MgSO4, 2% KH2PO4, 1% NaCl and 6% yeast extract as indicated by A540 of the inoculated medium after 48 hrs of growth. This modified medium such designed for biofertilizer production utilizing RW1 Rhizobial isolate could be considered for mass scale culture of the Dhaincha symbiont although field trials are recommended. Antibiotic Sensitivity Test on the RW1 strain revealed that the bacterium was most sensitive to streptomycin and kanamycin and was least affected by ampicillin as evident because of its Gram negative nature.

Water stress is the major abiotic constraint of cowpea production. The development of cowpea genotypes resilient to water stress is a practical approach to ameliorate the negative effects of water stress on the productivity. In the present study, a set of 20 genotypes of cowpea including 19 landraces collected from different areas of the Kashmir valley and one released variety viz, Shalimar Cowpea-1 released by SKUAST-Kashmir as check were evaluated under well watered and water stressed conditions.

AMF have been mentioned in several literatures for long time for their beneficial role in crop growth and productivity. However, recently they are talked about for efficient abiotic stress management which received equal attention among researchers. Salinity is such an abiotic stress faced by crop plants that can be minimized by assistance of AMF. In this article, we have discussed the possible mechanism and the identified species of AMF for abatement of salinity stress of plants by citing some suitable examples, apart from the harmful effects in crop plants’ functioning due to salinity usually take place. Though there is lots of scope of further research, this illustrative piece of information may generate interest among farmers and other common people.

At present, about two-third of the Indian population relies on indigenous knowledge of biological resources and have conserved their knowledge and culture through their traditional lifestyles and local economies. More than 7500 species of plants are utilized for the traditional purposes in India. The economic value of traditional knowledge in the herbal medicine and pharmaceutical sector is estimated to reach around 5 trillion by 2020. Since Indian agriculture is highly rich in biodiversity, it becomes an easy prey of biopiracy in agriculture-based business corporations. Biopiracy term is generally used when multinational corporations or companies profit from the medicinal and agricultural uses of plants known to indigenous or native societies and fail to compensate those communities. Traditional Knowledge (TK) plays a key role in the preservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. There is a threat to the future of TK due to globalization of production systems and the distance between the holders of knowledge and its exploiters. Many cases have been registered in India where attempts have been made to steal the indigenous knowledge from India due to its easy access which affect food security, livelihood of indigenous people and even cause changes in consumers’ choice. Indian government challenged many patents in the last two decades by providing numerous research papers predating those patents and these patents were thus rejected. India is the pioneer country in the world to have set up an institutional mechanism – the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) – to protect its TK.

This research study was mainly done on the process of various types of value-added products prepared from maize and the cost and return of value-added products made from maize by street vendors and established vendors. To find out the constraints in marketing of value added products of maize and suggest suitable measures to overcome them. The study was conducted in Raipur city of Chhattisgarh state. In which the Raipur city different sample was collect in randomly way. Out of the more than 50 established vendors, total 10 vendors were selected. Street vendors only select the corn related food vendors and collect the sample data from 20 street food vendors was selected out of all vendors. The primary data was collected through pre-tested structured interview schedule. Simple average and percentage methods was used for analyzing the data.

The colour of sugar free biscuit was recorded by hunter colour flex and the L*, a*, b*, value was 46.40, 12, 20.29, respectively. Developed sugar free biscuit was rich in calcium and magnesium and their concentration were observed 294.8mg/100g and 451.5mg/100g respectively by ion chromatography. Atomic absorption spectroscopy of developed sugar free biscuits was also performed for mineral analysis and reported that it contains iron (1.93mg/100g), copper (0.065mg/100g), and zinc (0.325 mg/100g). Fortified sugar free biscuits was also analysed by rapid visco analyser for pasting properties of starch, gelatin ionization of starch. The shelf-life of sugar free biscuit was lower at 37oC than at 10oC and 25oC. The HMF (Hydroxy Methyl Furfural) concentration which indicates the mallard reaction at a higher temperature and with increasing days of storage, the HMF concentration was also increased. The HMF increased to 6.1, 6.3, 6.5 μmol/100g at 10, 25, 37oC respectively after 30 days from 5.1 mol/100g which was the HMF value initially. The TBA (Thiobarbituric acid) also increased the most at 30 days storage at 10 oC as compared to 25 oC and 37oC, TBA value was 0.254, 0.265 and 0.286 respectively. The same result was seen in moisture content 5.1, 5.25., 5. 5% at 10 oC, 25 oC, 37 oC respectively from 4% of moisture initially content. The Microbiological studies concluded that the product was safe with no yeast and mould growth and coliform was also not detected. Only total plate count after 30 days was found 3×10 CFU/ml. The product was found safe for consumption even after 30 days of storage.