COTTON is produced in Maharashtra on about 42 lakh hectares, out of which 96 per cent cotton is produced in 20 districts. It also includes some important districts of Vidarbha. In the past few years, BT cotton has been plagued by pink bollworm and has been causing difficulties to cotton growers. Agrovision Foundation and SABC have been running ‘Pink Bollworm’ campaign in Vidarbha for the last 4 years thereby increasing awareness among farmers about pink bollworm. This campaign started from September 5, 2021 from Orange Market Hall, Kalmeshwar. On the occasion, Animal Husbandry, Dairy Business Development and Sports and Youth Welfare Minister, Government of Maharashtra Sunil Kedar flagged off the ‘Chitrarath’ to launch the campaign.

 

This year, Agrovision Foundation, SABC, Rasi Seeds and PI Foundation are jointly implementing the ‘Bandhan’ project in an area of about 300 acres in the villages of Adasa, Varoda and Mentpanjra. This is the country’s first pilot project for pink bollworm control. During the launch, the President of Angrovision Foundation Ravindra Boratkar, Dr C D Mayee, Secretary, Agrovision Foundation, Dr Bhagirath Choudhary, Founder Director, South Asia Biotech Centre (SABC), Jodhpur, Vice Chancellor PDKV Akola Dr Vilas Bhale, CICR Nagpur Director Dr Y G Prasad, P I Foundation’s Prashant Hegde, President of Rasi Seeds Dr Ramasamy, President of Buying and Selling Association Baba Kode, Chairman of APMC, Kalmeshwar Baba Patil, Ramesh Mankar, Sudhir Dive, Anandrao Raut, Milind Tichkule, Prashant Kukde, Sridhar Thackeray, Prashant Vasade and Vijay Jadhav were present as the chief guests.