It was August 2005. I visited Davis, CA and was guest of Chithra and Dr Lux Lakshmanan of California Agriculture Consulting Services. Over the next couple of days Lux (then 77) drove me a couple of hundred miles through a number of agricultural farms producing a range of crops: almonds, cantaloupes, corn, pistachios, pepper, pomegranates, sugar beet, tomatoes. I was struck by the high productivity levels of these crops that are multiple times of those in average Indian farms.
Lux explained the high productivity of tomatoes, at 80 tonnes/acre (California has just 10 inches of rain a year); these are harvested mechanically along with the plants and the fruits separated through vibrators and directly conveyed into 25 tonne bins in trucks moving in parallel. A number of tomatoes fall on the ground and these are ploughed along with the plant’s stems.
Lux also showed me a large factory where the tomatoes are pulped and transferred to the east coast for further processing. Lux also explained the high productivity levels achieved through a simple technique of ensuring the roots of the crop getting sufficient water and nutrients by ploughing the soil to a depth of 12 inches and more (he pointed to the tractors and bullock driven ploughs in Indian farms that are relatively small, churning the soil just to a depth of around 3 inches, denying water and fertilizers to the roots).
Through simple gadgets and systems Lux advocated testing soil for nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium (NPK) and for a dozen of other micro nutrients like Ca, Cu, Fe, Zn… He pointed to very few labs in India equipped to analyse, record and advise corrections for deficiencies in these.
With great passion Lux explained the several scientific practices that contributed to the profuse production, transportation, processing and marketing chain. I personally learnt a lot on the agronomical practices like nurturing beehives to aid pollination to the creation of wind barriers by planting fast-growing tall trees. I also had a demonstration of the ancient Tamil saying: agala uzhuvadilum aazha uzhu – the importance of tilling deep, not easy to attempt with wooden ploughs hauled by animal power, not even by small/medium capacity tractors. He helped to address the issue by using a tractor to form ridges and furrows; plant on the ridges and fertilise and water the furrows.
The visit expanded my interest in agriculture and resulted in the setting up of the Agriculture Consultancy Management Foundation (ACMF) as a not-for-profit trust to work on agri productivity improvement.
This experience goaded me to look at the advantages of agriculture in India. In January 2006 IE organised a demo on such simple techniques at the Gemini Farms, Padappai. M S Ahluwalia, F C Kohli, B Muthuraman, R Thyagarajan, B Santhanam, Exim Bank’s T C Venkatasubramanaian, APEDA Chairman K S Money led by Vikatan’s Balasubramanian (Balan) witnessed the demo.
Lux is a repository of productivity techniques. He graduated from the Madras University, obtained his Masters in botany from the Annamalai University, migrated to the land of opportunities, the US and obtained a doctorate in Agronomy from the Ohio State University. He had rich experience working for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in countries including Austria, Indonesia, Nigeria, Ghana, Sudan and Mexico.
He shared his rich expertise with Balan of Gemini Farms. Over two decades ago, the duo achieved quantum jumps in productivity through e-farming: Lux helped Balan to get his soil tested at Davis, advised on the corrections and enrichments needed and matching these to the selected crop and also annually visited the farm in Padappai.
Gemini Farms reached heights in productivity – over 40 tonnes of tomatoes, 25 tonnes of capsicum diversifying into coloured varieties, bajji chilli, Chinese cabbage… The duo proved Indian agriculture can be highly profitable!
Lux shared his immense knowledge with agricultural universities and policymakers. He was a strong advocate of genetic modification of crops and was not afraid to describe organic farming as a low productivity high cost fad. He used to ridicule the low quality of the Indian cow/buffalo dung: “can you compare the richness of the dung in a cow in Europeon large ranches of the US well-fed with alfa alfa grass, high nutrient feeds with vitamins with the MGR poster-fed buffalo of Tamil Nadu? What is the nutrition content of the latter? He pointed to the low average yield of these cattle: “how can the dung from these help achieve high productivity from the soil?” he would ask.
Lux was also equally critical of the so-called agriculture experts from the government and universities who visit US universities on special grants interested more in visiting shopping malls than farms or research labs.
