Port Blair, Jan 16: Under the Tribal Sub-Plan training on Nutritious Kitchen Garden was conducted on 14th & 15th January, 2015 at Harminder Bay for the Nicobari Tribals of the area. Mr. Fred Lewi first captain was the Chief guest, Mr. Festus Nathaniel, Secretary the guest of honour and Shri Timothy, 4th Captain presided over.
The Chief guest Mr. Fred Lewi expressed his happiness on the conduct of capacity building as per the demand given by them by the team of scientists of ICAR-CIARI under the plan and guidance of Dr. S. Dam Roy, Director of the Institute. He further informed that by practising vegetable gardening with the vegetable kits and the techniques imparted by the experts earlier, they could grow the vegetables like bhendi, bottle gourd, chilli, tomato, pumpkin and brinjal which could supplement the vegetable requirement for the family for a period of more than a month. Around seven families took up the concept of NKG and he assured that in coming days more families will be adopting the same.
Dr. S.K. Zamir Ahmed, Senior Scientist and Mr. Amit Srivastava, STO explained in length on the pros and cons of the NKG with special reference to nutrition security of the family. During the interaction session of testing the knowledge on the vegetables it was found that more than 50% of the trainees knew about 20 to 25 types of vegetables. In addition their desire to opt for growing nutritious vegetables in the backyard paved way for the adoption of the technology. The trainees got their doubt clarified and requested to visit the place where the vegetables were grown.
The Captain, Secretary and the tribal women who participated in large numbers expressed their happiness on methodology of the training which was very beneficial to them. The programme was attended by a total of 51 farmers of which 25 were women and 26 men, who were provided with one vegetable kits to each having ten different types of vegetables for growing in their backyard .
On 15th January, 2015 field visit and interaction by the teams were made to get the feed back on the vegetable grown and their preference of the other crops. Overall the programme was facilitated by the team comprising of Dr. S.K. Zamir Ahmed and Mr. Amit Srivastava from ICAR-CIARI, Port Blair.
(
