Anirban's Success Story with Farmics?

Anirban is a small tea grower in Jalpaiguri, West Bengal who tends a four-acre tea farm, where he mainly depends on chemical fertilisers to increase tea output year after year. In recent years, he has also been facing mounting challenges on his farm due to unpredictable weather conditions and pests.

In long-term monoculture tea plantations such as his, the prolonged use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides has resulted in soil acidification, soil sickness, and plant regeneration issues, hindering tea plant growth and tea quality. This has ultimately resulted in low yield and fewer earnings for Anirban, and thousands of farmers like him.

West Bengal, where Jalpaiguri is located, is the highest tea-producing state in India, followed by Assam, where in 2022 the estimated production volume of tea hit around 26 million kilograms. This problem scenario Anirban grapples with is seen replicated multiple times over the entire tea plantation-rich area where his farm is located.

The elevated mountainous topography and high rainfall enjoyed by West Bengal lend the region the ideal conditions to grow tea, as tea plantations require high precipitation and well-drained land to thrive.

However, farmers' heavy reliance on inorganic chemical agri-inputs has adversely affected the soil's organic content, making?it more prone to erosion during the rainy season.?

More than 150-year-long exploitation of soil under tea cultivation has impacted soil quality and soil fertility in this region. For local tea growers, maintaining soil nutritional quality is a massive economic burden. Agri-input and fertiliser costs constitute a substantial portion of the production cost of tea – which is a major source of revenue in this?industrially backward region.

Furthermore, the lack of sufficient soil testing facilities leads to the frequent injudicious application of chemical fertiliser, further compounding the issue.

Seeing Results

The long laundry list of soil fertility issues plaguing this area made this an ideal ground for us to apply our BioAg solutions to. Anirban’s farm was one of the earliest farms selected to run our field trials, using our 100% organic EcoCert-certified ASAAVA.

Enriched with humic and fulvic acids, ASAAVA by Farmics? enhances nutrient uptake, improves plant growth, and increases crop yield, while also enhancing tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses.

We started conducting field trials using ASAAVA in the region and were able to ultimately?reduce fertiliser usage by 50%, thus helping farmers save on input costs while improving soil quality.

The treated plot, spread over 800 square feet, yielded 21.7 kgs of tea, while the control plot yielded 16 kgs of tea. Anirban observed a 35% increase in yield and a decrease in the incidence of pests like tea mosquito bugs and blister blight in the?ASAAVA-treated plot, along with early bud bursts, despite unpredictable climate conditions.

Anirban’s story is just one among the small-but-growing number of farmer success stories we have noticed on-ground during our trials. Using Farmics? BioAg solutions has ensured sustainability and profitability for farmers, and quality for consumers.