Gandhinagar, Dec 10 (IANS): The Dutch and the Gujarat governments are in talks over improving farming in salinity ingressed waters of the state's shoreline. The Netherlands Business Support Office (NBSO) in Ahmedabad has even indicated that a 'Centre of Excellence' (CoE) is coming up for the purpose in Gujarat.
"There were discussions which were already happening in Gujarat (before the Covid-19 situation), to create a Centre of Excellence in saline farming. A huge percentage of land has a lot of salinity, not just near the coastal areas but also inside the hinterland in Gujarat. The salinity is more than what is cultivable for traditional farming," the Trade and Investment Commissioner, Netherlands Business Support Office (NBSO) Amlan Bora told reporters.
Bora said that the Netherlands faced a similar problem with a significant part of the country below sea level. Almost 27 per cent of the Netherlands is below sea level.
"Together with the Wageningen University, the most premier university in the world for agriculture and working with seed companies, water companies, forming a consortium, the Dutch has developed over the last fifteen years, ways of cultivating in saline waters," added Bora.
"Interestingly, the process of cultivating in saline waters require less fresh waters than traditional farming. We had a couple of discussion going on with the Gujarat government but unfortunately, the Covid-19 situation picked up," he asserted.
"This can reduce the salinity ingressed areas of the state.. This is definitely one area, where such a Centre of Excellence can come up, but it all depends on the interests and willingness of both the partners," Bora said.
Soil salinity is affecting large areas in the world and millions of farmers affected with it and many are even forced to migrate. Salt tolerant crops can help these farmers to increase their yields and provide a good livelihood in salt affected areas.
The Dutch government have set up seven Centres of Excellence in different parts of India, in many states, Marten van den Berg, the Ambassador of the Netherlands to India, Nepal and Bhutan told the reporters. These centres cover variety of sectors such as potatoes, vegetables, dairy and such.
"These CoE will be not having a very high end technologies, but low and medium technologies. But it is very important to teach the farmers to adapt these technologies," said the Dutch Ambassador.
Berg also hinted that there might be a CoE in Gujarat also if the talks with the government were fruitful.
Berg was leading a delegation of Dutch companies which are participating in 'Agri Asia 2021', an international exhibition and conference on agricultural technologies being held between December 9 and 11 at helipad ground in Gandhinagar.