According to the experts, Indian agriculture is going to be the blooming sector in future. But not with our traditional techniques also with the new artistic ideas. Today in this module we are going to discuss such a successful but underrated topic in India – Aquaponics. In the time of pandemic every sector collapsed. But there was a startup which gracefully walked on the paths of success. India’s one of the largest startup of aquaponics was started by two IITians Mayank Gupta and Lalit Zhavar. Mayank is from Hyderabad and Lalit is from Mumbai. Both were from different backgrounds but their interest made them work together. Their basic concept behind starting this work was that, there are N no. of people sleeping hungry daily and nothing grown can be wasted but the thing is you should have the capability to make it reachable to them.
Aquaponics is the combination of aquaculture and hydroponics. Food produced in this is organic.
Aquaponic setup
Mayank traveled world wide to find the best formula to resolve the problem of hunger. Counting from Israel, Canada, America, China and Hong . These countries are advanced in agricultural technology. While they were busy in studying different experiences but their fortune was busy in building the idea of aquaponics. Within the next 15 months they started their dream project, hand in hand with the Land Craft company. After the tour of agricultural advanced countries ,they started their search for the best place in India for their setup and landed up to Kolhapur Maharashtra. Where they studied different climatic factors. Two major reason for choosing Kolhapur as their land-
- Climate- It is more suitable when compared to other districts in Maharashtra.
- Logistically it was a pretty good place because they can connect 6 huge metropolitan cities, and transport their harvest overnight .
They started their setup in 1 hectare of land. They installed a greenhouse with 3 bore wells from which water is filtered and sent in a huge tank. Fisheries are the main key for their successful business and Fishes are considered as a living pesticides which reduces the chances of pest attack. Open the pores of roots and enhances oxygen supply. Their stool results in increasing fertility, this means all round profit. Looking towards the benefits of fishes Lalit and Mayank installed 130 tanks for fishes where 30 tons of fishes are present .
Amount of Production in aquaponics.
30 types of vegetables are grown in Land craft and they earn up to 10 crores in just 1 hectare of land. Continuous increasing health conscious factors in the Indian public made it easier to sell their harvest. Quantitative production of this farming is 300 to 350 kg per day in 1 hectare. Which can increase up to 1000 kg per day ,but because of less demand it is limited. The most beneficial thing in aquaponic , it is self-sustaining farming usage of water is 90% lower than soil farming. In abroad there is high demand for such crops.
High scope for employment
Both have more than 150 employees with better wages and 80% of them are females. Looking forward to the progress of poor farmers and their contribution. They have signed a contract with 100 farmers for 100 acres of land. Where they tested for soil and water quality for stability of quality. They serve very well service to farmers by giving fixed rates for their harvest beyond a year. So by chance due to some natural reasons harvest is not good they will get fair price for their hard work.
Loopholes of this business-
Both Mayank and Lalit are from prosperous families and invested up to 10 crores in this startup. Now in 2021 it is an expensive startup with many loopholes such as investment, training and market but this is the absolute future of farming, and there are many people doing this technique in the form of vertical farming on their terrace.
CONCLUSION
In an interview Lalit and Mayank mentioned their family and friends support. Which is extremely important in any field for success. They both are the new face of India. We need to understand the need of new startups in agriculture. Otherwise we will face a huge shortage of food in the coming years. Not instantly but there is a hope for better tomorrow.