It takes courage and gumption to think out of the box. And more often than not, taking the unbeaten path gives results that bring a deep sense of satisfaction to the risk-taker. That has been the case for four young, educated and enterprising farmers from Buldhana, who cultivated strawberry in their 4-acre farm, and reaped sweet returns. Strawberry in the hot weather of Vidarbha would sound like a bad move to many, but the four youths have proved them wrong. Vijay Ubale, who has completed MBA after completing a degree in agriculture, Ram Wagh, who is currently pursuing Ph D at Kashmir in the subject of Plant Science, Ram Sarode, who is a civil engineer by education, and Ritwik Jatkar are the four progressive ‘farmers’. In Maharashtra, Mahabaleshwar is the strawberry capital and in recent times, cultivations has also started to some extent in Nagpur and Amravati districts. Taking a cue from this, the four friends thought, why not Buldhana?

 

They studied the synamics of things thoroughly and took a plunge. In November last year, they brought strawberry seedlings from Mahabaleshwar for cultivation on a four-acre farm near Buldhana city. There planning and effective crop management bore fruits, quite literally, as the farm was filled with the pretty-looking strawberries. The four friends said that the strawberries are in great demand from far and wide due to their extreme sweetness and quality. They give the credit of this success to their experimental attitude. The young farners say that all three aspects have been achieved namely higher income in less area, water-fertiliser savings and quality fruits. Since strawberries are in demand all year round, multi-faceted sales options such as direct sales, hotel-bakery chains and direct contracts with local markets became available. Howeever, this experiment is not limited to financial success but also proves a point in terms of crop diversification, risk sharing and the growing inclination of the youth towards agriculture in the context of climate change.

 

The four give confidence that cultivation of high-value crops is possible in Vidarbha too, with proper planning and use of technology. Further, the experiment, which is based on science and avoids traditional farming, strengthens the direct consumer-farmer chain by providing demonstrations and training to local farmers, linking them to the processing industry (jam, pulp, frozen strawberries) and giving a new and inspiring colour to agriculture. Meanwhile, local MLA Sanjay Gaikwad, Buldhana Civic Chief Pooja Gaikwad, Shiv Sena District Chief Om Singh Rajput and others also visited the farm recently. Gaikwad was all praise for the enterprising youth. “Since there is no guarantee whether the experiment will be successful or not, traditional agriculture is still given priority. In that scenario, it is creditable that the four highly-educated youths took a bold step and took a handsopme crop of strawberry in the hot weather of Vidarbha,” Gaikwad said. He called upon other youth to take inspiration from them and step out of the traditional structure of agriculture for better returns.