Corn farmers in 5 states reap benefits from farm interventions: Corteva

Corteva Agriscience on Tuesday claimed that its farm intervention in five states, like Maharashtra and Karnataka, helped smallholding farmers growing corn reap benefits.

Training on new agri-methods and adoption of farm mechanisation among other interventions has led to "much-needed increase in income" of small farmers, it said.

"...we have been working to empower smallholder farmers across five large Indian regions by enabling them to mechanize their corn crop production and providing training on new agricultural methods that increase plant population, crop productivity and profitability for farmers," Corteva Agriscience South Asia Marketing Director Aruna Rachakonda said in a statement.

In Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, Karnataka, and Rajasthan, Corteva said it has distributed corn seed planters to select farmers at subsidised prices and given them access to high-yield potential/low-cost maize hybrids suitable for the agro-climate.

This provides greater control over maize seed production than the traditional regional practice of using high-yield/high-cost hybrids for limited areas and low-cost seeds for the remainder, which reduced productivity, it added.

The company also trained these farmers on agronomic practices and usage of seed planters, held demonstrations of seed and fertiliser machines to enable best practices, introduced accurate drying practices and established cold storage units as well as sorting, grading and packing units.

In addition to farm mechanisation, Corteva has also focused on empowering 12,000 tribal women corn farmers. This included training on agricultural methods, providing smart crop production technology and establishing an ecosystem of 'farmer producer companies' (FPC) to create market linkages and an end-to-end value chain.

"As a result of these efforts, the farmers in these five regions were able to optimally use the brief window available for Kharif maize sowing with lower environmental impact than in the past and a much-needed increase in income," the company said.