ICAR - Central Arid Zone Research Institute

The agriculture production system in the North-western part of Rajasthan is mostly rainfed, mono-cropped and of subsistence type because of climatic constraints. But even under these conditions, Sh. Satta Ram Choudhary of Jasti Village in Barmer district of Rajasthan has successfully achieved twin objectives of profitability and livelihood security by growing combination of fruits and crops. Earlier Shri Satta Ram along with his 5 family members used to survive by growing subsistence crops like pearl millet, mung bean, moth bean, cucurbits etc. on his farm and he often had to work in nearby sand stone mines or at construction sites for his livelihood. In the year 2011, he came in contact with the Central Arid Zone Research Institute, Jodhpur through some friend and came to know about interventions in agriculture and horticulture fields. Following construction of a water harvesting pond of 10 lakh litre capacity with the government support he started following the scientific advisories of scientists of CAZRI. He constructed a small water tank at a height of 5 m in the middle of his farm for storing water for use in irrigation through drip irrigation using gravitational force. Firstly, he grew fruit plants and then followed intercropping of mung bean and moth bean in initial years. A total of 800 plants of different fruit species (Ber, lasora and sour lime) supplied by CAZRI were planted by him in 2012. With the technical input and constant supervision of CAZRI scientists, he started getting the returns from orchard from third year onwards