Thiruvananthapuram: Malayalam cinema’s romantic hero of 70 and early 80s, Raghavan has declared that the rest of his life will be devoted for promoting organic farming in Kerala. According to him, the deluge of heavily poisoned vegetables was mainly because of the blatant commercialization of agriculture. “If we start our own vegetable cultivation in whatever space available at terraces and yards, the disaster can be annulled to a large extent” Mr. Raghavan said. He also added that from now his objective would be to promote everyone who pursues organic farming; as well as practicing the same at his own. He was inaugurating a one-day training in high-tech kitchen garden yesterday (Aug 29) at the seminar hall of Centre for Innovation in Science and Social Action (CISSA), Udarasiromani Road, Vellayambalam. Shri. Raghavan also enjoyed the day-long event sitting throughout with a student’s curiosity.
The training was offered by Dr. P. Suseela, Director, High-tech Training Centre, Kerala Agriculture University, Thrissur. Participants were given training in multi-tier grow bag system which enables agriculture in the minimum space. All about customized irrigation capable of keeping grow bags enough damp even if no watering is done for a week, was also of handed down. Owing to lesser care demanded, high-tech kitchen gardens are suitable for office goes who have a passion for agriculture. Taught was the way to grow about 150 to 350 plants in a limited space of around 10 to 30 square meters.
40 participants from different parts of the State attended the training programme. General Secretary of CISSA, Dr. C. Suresh Kumar; Director, Noble Farming, Dr. C.K. Peethambaran; Director CISSA-Organic Farming Resource Centre, Dr. N.G. Balachandranath; and agriculture expert, Sathan KK spoke on the occasion.
